Julio Larraz: Poesia, Potere, Ironia, Sutri (VT)
"... anything can become magical or a source of inspiration — you just need to change the way you look at things." - Julio Larraz
The Contini Art Gallery in collaboration with the Municipality of Sutri is pleased to announce Poesia, Potere, Ironia a solo exhibition dedicated to Julio Larraz, one of the most esteemed contemporary Latin American artists, at the Palazzo Doebbing Museum.
The exhibition is part of the museum’s program for the promotion of contemporary art and features a significant selection of paintings, sculptures, and works on paper that explore the central themes of the artist’s poetics: identity, power, memory and irony.
Born in Havana in 1944, Larraz left Cuba in 1961, distancing himself from a regime that restricted individual freedom. After beginning his career in New York as a political cartoonist for publications such as the New York Times and the Washington Post, he embarked on an independent and distinctive painting path, where visual storytelling is combined with a refined use of light, color, and composition.
His art blends elements of Caribbean culture, European influences, and cinematic references. His works, constructed like true theatrical scenes, are inhabited by enigmatic figures, settings suspended between dream and reality, and recurring visual motifs that evoke the language of cinema. The result is an imaginative yet deeply conscious universe, where irony becomes both a critical and poetic tool.
A central theme in his work is power, which Larraz approaches with a sharp and irreverent gaze, exposing its contradictions and ridiculing its excesses. His style, simultaneously sophisticated and accessible, alternates between the grotesque and introspection, critique and lightness.
Deeply connected to Italy, and particularly to Pietrasanta, where he created many of his sculptures, Larraz has exhibited at major Italian venues such as the Complesso del Vittoriano in Rome, the Puglisi Cosentino Foundation in Catania, and the Contini Art Gallery, establishing a strong relationship with the country’s cultural scene.
Poesia, Potere, Ironia will guide visitors through the historic halls of Palazzo Doebbing, offering an immersive experience into the artist’s universe, where each work is an invitation to reflect, smile, and imagine.
