At Chinatown’s Red Pipe Gallery Albert Vitela’s “New Works” exhibition revealed the Los Angeles native’s work as a sweeping panoply of color; abstract depictions of historical events, religious figures, and celebrities. Worlds expressed in fragments of motion-filled color, Vitela combines memories and history in a combination of pop art and abstract expressionism.
Curated by art critic Mat Gleason, Vitela’s show is about history, anger, war, peace, resolution, and beauty. His belief is that beauty itself cannot exist without awareness, and that peace can become a natural outgrowth of this awareness. He seeks mystical, surreal moments from concrete events ranging from World War II to battles between Samurai, all of which exist for Vitela beyond conventional time constraints.
Vitela has a strong concept in mind when he paints. “My goal is to enrich humanity through my work. I want to create an environment that leads to world peace. You look at television news and you see warfare, you see crime, you see situations such as Watergate. I meditate on all these things. On warfare and peace, the beauty and the ugliness. And then I meld them together.” He finds himself inspired by both current and historical events, and views them as of one piece.
Vitela’s art uses an Impressionist’s color palette in his abstract approach. His samurai in “Kojiro Vs. Musashi, Ganryujima Japan” are cast in striking yellow and blue, his angels’ skin is salmon pink. “I’m looking to create in my art, in my meditation, a beautiful future for the human race. If we do what we say, if we want what we see, that’s emblematic of both war and peace. We can go either way. My paintings express that.”
A talented emerging artist, Vitela works from his own dreams to create vibrant dreamscapes of figures from history and modern life.
- Genie Davis