A Graveyard of Half-Baked Ideas

Lara de los Reyes, "I Put Your Face In My Pocket, The Rest Of You I Don't Need"

The show fits the space so perfectly that it should feel like a cliche.  Only it doesn’t.  Lara delos Reyes follows up The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter, her solo debut earlier this year, with this show at Green Papaya Art Projects.   In A Graveyard of Half-Baked Ideas, Lara channels the effects of her grandmother’s passing. Just as grief makes its mark on the bereft, so does it scar the mementos and artifacts that belonged to a beloved who has moved on.  A gaping hole disfigures a portrait that has been cut for a locket.   Pieces of furniture hide under dust sheets.  Frames hang empty.  Even the dust congeals into something else. The gallery’s unfinished interior complements the aura of  simple, understated desolation.

Lara de los Reyes, "Let The Blind Lead Those Who Can See But Cannot Hear"

I thought her drawing technique, with its faint, almost invisible lines,  went well with her allusion to fading memories. You have to look very close to see her figures. Like ghostly apparitions, they disappear at certain angles. I particularly liked her two drawings of skeleton hands installed on either side of a wall chandelier.  They make a rude gesture as a final farewell.

The installation We’ve All Had Time To Sleep recalls instances at Lara’s grandmother’s when they would awake to find snakes crawling inside the house.  She makes this personal tribute to the woman she lived with as a child.

Lara de los Reyes, "The Naked and Outcast Seek Pieces There"

It seems a pity to  break this show apart.  All the pieces fit so well together,  you wonder how each will fare in another context.  That’s just my opinion, of course. It obviously will not make a difference to the collectors who have snapped up everything, down to the last rubber snake.

Concurrent to this, Lara joins a group show in Kuala Lumpur at Richard Koh Fine Arts.  Towards the end of next year, she’s planning another solo exhibit at Finale’s Upper Gallery.

Installation View

A Graveyard of Half-Baked Ideas runs from 7 to 28 November  at Green Papaya Art Projects, T. Gener St., Kamuning Quezon City. Or visit http://www.greenpapayaartprojects.org or http://papayapost.blogspot.com

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGFQ_TY5f3w

Lara de los Reyes, "These Sensations Make Me Feel Pleasures Of A Normal Man"

Lara de los Reyes, "We've All Time To Sleep"

Lara de los Reyes, "As I Keep Dreaming, The Dust Keeps Settling", dust particles bound together