Albano

Albano Hernández Domíngues, Albano for short, is a contemporary Spanish artist born in 1988. Originally from Avila, near Madrid, Albano now lives and works in Cambridge in the UK. As far as abstract art goes his painting is characterized by vivid colours and a repetition and accumulation of abstract, often geometric motifs.

Albano has won different awards and merits amongst which the BMW Painting Award in 2012 when he was 24. He has been fortunate enough to be part of several artist residencies particularly in Miami, and has given more than ten exhibitions of his work in different galleries. Added to which his work has been collected by Spanish foundations and pubic institutions.

When he was younger Albano began learning the techniques of painting alongside his father. He went on to study Fine Arts for 7 years, from 2005 to 2012 in Avila and then Madrid. It was at this time that Albano developed a more theoretical approach to his painting, which in turn had him questioning himself. Albano has always been inspired by the Castilian landscapes he knows so well. I.e. vast stretches of fields of a bright and persistent green, a green that we so often find in his paintings. This colour appears in a cyclical fashion in Albano's paintings as to him it's a reminder. Albano's move to Cambridge in England corresponds to what he himself calls his 'Desert period' during which his paintings focus on his most cherished souvenirs. Today Albano feels the need to explore another angle and finds his inspiration by focusing wholly on the painting itself. This he calls his 'Atlas period'. That's to say Albano has found in his studio's surroundings, in his personal space, his new inspiration which has now become, in his own words, his 'new desert'.

Albano's painting is unquestionably abstract. His paintings are filled with intense swathes of colour and made up of different motifs and overlapping shapes. Recurrent features in his painting include the use of the colour green and a checkered pattern- signifying complementarity and unity. Clearly akin to the legacy left over from Formalism, Albano is trying to get away from a realist interpretation and concentrate only on drawing the viewer into the painting itself and all it represents. Art critic Brane Kovic nicely summed up this idea when writing about the work of Albano « (…) no matter how it is achieved, it is only a question of emotion, of the capacity to identify with this inner power of the work that words alone cannot describe and which the famous line from French poet Paul Valery sums up "we must always apologize for talking about painting.