GUI CALIL
Born on April 20, 1974 in Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo, Brazil, Gui Calil holds a degree in Communication specializing in Marketing and Advertising.
His background intertwines with that of design on paper as his family business has been providing graphic services, including unique customized printed material, since 1966.
Playing around with reams of paper since childhood, he discovered the pleasure of turning his thoughts into colors and printed shapes. His passion for art and design, forever burning in his restless soul, found the ideal outlet in works of acrylic on canvas.
With no limitations of space or tools, his work is a transcription in colors of his torments and most visceral yearnings, defined by the artist as the "aesthetics of the soul".
Missing home
To paint is to write a letter of longing. Homesickness. Missing our home far away. By far.
Anguish to return, without being able to. As if the cry for help were stuck somewhere between the throat and the center of the chest. A certain point between feeling and dreaming.
And, inasmuch as the words do not live inside, the things that are outside are the colors, pains, and risks of those who do not master the act, but who do master the fact that the origin, by tact, needs to live its longing as much as I do.
CALL IT NOSTALGIA, THAT WHICH, IN ANGER OR POETRY, I CALL MAGIC. MINE AND MY PEOPLE´S. SHAPELESS, AND TIMELESS.
And so, like a son willing to die far away from those who made his version controversial, I surrender.
To die for the truth. To speak a language I do not master. But one which arises like the clarity and doubt of my language. I know the forms, but not the content. Like a secret book capable of opening the doors to humanity's oldest dreams.
I feel old. Like the devil and our struggles. As if age would not allow me to return. Strange pain. A pain of memories. And they hurt like scars left by an avid hand tearing the thin skin of an old manuscript. Definitive marks. Like a treaty. A vile excommunication.
And when will these paints, colors and pains free the way? Or is it always just a letter? No paper to carry your marks.
I dream around. I draw hope.
Portuguese version
GuiCalil_Saudade de Casa
The power of colors.
Dealing with colors is a challenge for fine arts. The tones allow each artist endless possibilities for dialogue, leaving open visual games of the most varied natures.
Gui Calil uses colors in imaginative ways. His works in acrylic on canvas have as a common element the establishment of an aesthetic and poetry based on the exploration of freedom in space and in relation to his work tools.
Each work has something to declare in order to express a particular relationship with reality. It is as if each new canvas dialogues with the observer individually, but within a large project, in which one of the assumptions is to provide and allow emotions to emerge.
IN AN INITIAL MOMENT, IMPACT IS WHAT MATTERS. IT IS IMPOSSIBLE NOT TO HAVE ANY REACTION BEFORE WHAT GUI CALIL PRESENTS, THEN A REFLECTION IS REACHED, THAT IS, THE QUESTION ASKED IS HOW THE ARTIST USES HIS RESOURCES TO ACHIEVE THE DESIRED EFFECT.
The paintings work as one big family. There are blood links between them, but also differences in atmosphere and personality. Each of the works demands a particular observation, but this does not prevent a view of the whole, since one of the characteristics of quality art is precisely the alternative of generating blocks of thought that are articulated in the name of some concept or idea.
Gui Calil's work as a whole impresses by offering a wide color repertoire that is mobilized in a range where there is a chance to discover new paths with each reflection. This means that his work is not consumed by sameness, but expands his creative spectrum with each look. Thus, his art conserves freshness and points to even more daring journeys in the near future.
Oscar D’Ambrosio holds a doctorate in Education, Art and History of Culture from Mackenzie University and a master's in Arts from the Institute of Arts at Unesp.
Portuguese version
GuiCalil_A Forca das Cores
