deckchairs 2015-
This Series comprises very large formats as well as very small and intimate works, in painting and drawing, monotype prints and even installations.
Deckchairs and other outdoor leisure furniture and architectural elements appear quite often in Renata’s photographic archive from Venezuela's urban jungle, tennis club and poolsides in her natal city, Caracas. The deckchairs, rather old yet still in use in her city, struck her from the very beginning as a nostalgic element that knocks on the door of the collective memory. The chairs became signifiers. The paintings of this series are devoid of people and their narrative is static.
In this series the very large formats go un-stretched and hang very much like a photographic backdrops, becoming installations. Yet the very small paintings draw attention in the realm of intimacy, as one-to-one appreciation is the only way to view these small works, easing the way for contemplations of sorts.
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This series followed Renata’s intense period of drawing almost exclusively, and it seems quite clear that there is a before and an after in her way of approaching painting (see Only Drawing Allowed). These paintings have a realistic approach towards the nature elements used in the composition, while furniture and architectural element acquired a symbolic status, appearing often untouched, unpainted, barely sketched while surrounded by realistic monster-like vegetation, using at times inverted perspective in order to create the illusion of immersion.
