doniel-de-tus-escalerasIn Doniel Espinoza’s series, Escaleras al Sueño the artist combines great technical skill with a perfect measure of surrealist absurdity to visually tell his audience small, but beautiful, magical realist stories.

The objects in Espinoza’s paintings are, in a sense, overly familiar. We live with them daily, we interact with them casually, but those things – the city, the sofa, the cabinet, the piano, the table, the fruit – are intimately a part of our lives. They are our home, they provide us rest, they give us music, the are our family temples, they sate our hunger. Collectively, they provide space for our memory. They are the icons of our most intimate history.

As a series, Escaleras al Sueño, which means both Stairs to Sleep and Stairs to the Dream reminds the viewer to recollect moments of joy, of loss and of our place – achieved or unwanted – in this world. And it begs us to strive for something more beautiful, yet.

Espinoza’s use of profoundly dark shadows, in paintings that also employ colors central to the Guatemalan cultural palette, draws forth a double-edged question. What is the dream towards which we are aspiring? What is the reality to which we are bound?

For the viewer, such questions only add to the richness of the visual and spiritual experience.

Doniel Espinoza, born in 1970, has participated in more than 30 group shows in Guatemala, El Salvador, Ecuador, the United States and Germany. His works are currently showing at La Antigua Galería del Arte on 4 Calle Oriente No. 15, between 1st and 2nd Avenidas.

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About the Author

Michael Tallon, Editor-in-Chief, head writer and delivery boy, of La Cuadra Magazine, expatriated from the States 11 years ago. After spending a year in Antigua gasbagging about wanting to start an English Language magazine, he hit the road and wandered about South America, India and Nepal before finding himself sipping tea in Darjeeling and realizing that maybe it was time to head home and pick up the career path. That ill-fated adventure in New York lasted about 6 weeks before he headed back to Antigua, Guatemala, where John Rexer had actually started the magazine in his absence.

After a few months, Mike took over the magazine and has been going slowly broke since. On that note, Mike would like to invite advertisers, readers and potential patrons to send him free money.
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