Alonso Leon-Velarde's work combines elements of personal history, science fiction, and contemporary subjects, invoking the idea of a pictorial symbol, as an after-image or residue of Latin American metropolitan life.
The paintings and drawings merge themes of loss and defeat with expressions of celebration and resilience; functioning as metaphors for inherited modalities of confrontation, and syncretism. The paintings look to integrate material, using an adaptive semiotic logic, that is associative rather than descriptive.
The built surfaces are visible evidence of residue, the speed of execution, and the slowness of sedimentation. The pentimento looks to integrate the picture as a painted gesture, in which sharp, organic and voluptuous movements find their place at the center of the work.
The action happens at the periphery of the form, sometimes erecting itself against the edges of the canvas. Using a somewhat forensic approach, the artist considers the ways western media travels and permeates South American visual cultures. Closely examining a landscape where magical and spiritual belief is grounded on faith, the work proposes an imaginative and futuristic alternative to understanding the intricacies of life in a Latin context. Posing a dynamic where an impression or preconceived notion of what something is changes.