Mapas de subconciencias is the ninth solo exhibition of Octavio Irving whose main purpose was to “put the Cuban public aware of the most recent artistic production of the creator, also showing his role as artist and the problems that afflict him” (Crespo, 2015). The exhibition was opened to the public between September 24 and October 23, 2015 at the Villena Gallery of the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC), located in Vedado, in Havana.
“The finiteness of (this) existence represents a cause of sleeplessness to Irving, it causes him anxiety and, for that reason, he channeled into his creative process. The allusion to the zoomorfo is for him a resource, so it is not an accident that human heads, birds and generic demonic rabbits are the protagonists of his works. The habit makes the monk goes an old proverb, which is why the reclining figure of the bird reminisce the spatial distribution of the boats chasing him when he was winning La Joven Estampa, back in 2007. Excluding obsession -bequeathed by the engraving- of the modular elements from drawing seriality that brings us to make questions” about the existence of the original things (Crespo, 2015, words to the catalog).
In this brief and convincing exhibition, he invited us to reflect on the human condition and its animal essence. “Formally there is a chromatic unity in the expo given from the red, ocher and black values. The use of blasting prints a peculiar seal while simulating wear, melting, fire (perhaps human species?). Strokes and strokes are strong and works go from the small to the large format and media ranging from paper and canvas”(Crespo, 2015). With five works, Irving proposed us an approach to the complexity of the occult and the underlying thing that configures and gives meaning to life.
