Deconstructed: Ernesto Artillo

There is a feeling I once felt that was yearning to be felt again.  It was the gentle rush of capturing a glimpse of artistry so pure, there was still thought dripping on canvas.

During my nightly trips to the worldwide known inspiration board we all call Pinterest, I toppled with a peculiar image; whereas I not only saw, I felt.  For as, when a grand sentiment suddenly takes over all sight and entrances my every being, I then know I have formed a lifelong bond with it.  That very sentiment is instilled in the thought provoking deconstruction of intricate reconstruction for which only Andalucía native, Ernesto Artillo could conjure.  In them, a delicate tranquility is instilled with the notion merged dreamlike surreal vistas (or wider known as daydreams) our cerebral complex provokes.  My severe admiration (and borderline obsession) over his creations led me to the quite gutsy move of sending a completely arbitrary email.  It pretty much consisted of me gushing and asking him to do a quick interview.  I hit send with the routine expectation of not getting an answer back, nonetheless, a little ding in my mailbox reassured me how wondrous life can be.

- Please note this interview took place late 2014-

FN:   Tell us a brief history about how you became fascinated by art.

EA:   I think feeling art is like feeling love and we all have the need of that feeling. So then experiment with art would be something very natural, even thought you don't put it on words, or paintings or pictures. Yesterday my very good friend Antonio Burgos was at home and we where talking exactly about this, how intimate to relate our lives with art, I told him that even though lot of people insist that what I do is art I feel really artistic when I am just with the people I love.

FN:   Your creations rely on the deconstructing and fusing of various elements, how do you couple each intricate detail into one masterful commingle?

EA:   Thank you for that. Well I look for the chaos when I literally break a picture (even though is my own ones) but then when I reconstruct it, I look for the balance, I really spent time putting everything in order, because thats my real order, thats how I really understand that image, so its like the place each image have in the final result is the same one they have in my mind as a concept.

FN:   Even though there lies such detailing, how do you remain that lovely mist of surrealist simplicity? 

EA:   I love surrealist artists, and some how I understand they where just being so realist in their own way. It is like an exercise of being honest with how reality is built in our head, like when we are dreaming.

FN:   Do tell, how are these masterpieces constructed?  Do you have any routines while working? 

EA:   Not at all. I make both handmade and digital (normally when I have a fashion collaboration because it needs a very clear detail). I put the music on and start breaking and  fixing. In the process I ask my people very often what they think.

FN:   Looking at your recent work, you’ve been inspired by the season’s tendencies in fashion.  What in them makes you enkindle the delicate creativity you’ve been endowed with?

EA:   I have a very close relation with fashion but mainly as a way to express creativity, actually I am not a big fashion or trends consumer. In that way it is of course  big aesthetic inspiration for me, such as religion, classic sculptures, modern artists, music.. so I do the same, use it as a support to cut it and give it a personal meaning. 

FN:   Do we see bits of Ernesto Artillo’s soul in the deconstruction of fine art? 

EA:   Yes, for me it is impossible to separate it as it is a big base of art. At the same time I am interested in what good taste means and I discover more and more than it is always related with classic art, in dance, paint... but also in fashion. I think to be modern it is really helpful to have a classic background. 

FN:   Your pieces exude a muted delicate serenity, is this your way of showing how you view or wish to see the world? 

EA:   It doesn't mean I am a very balanced person at all, but it is that I know to be balanced sometimes is very good for me so I look for it and probably I translate it in my works. If you see them, you are right theres a lot of serenity, but at the same time theres passion, in the naked bodies, the colors, sensuality, blindness...





FN:   Each and every piece is seen as thought provoking and sentimentally decorated, would you agree? 

EA:   I am from Andalucía, this heavenly and savage region in the South of Spain where tradition and folklore is highlight important with a very strong aesthetic elements. I am highly influences by everything I have seen but by everything I have felt with that images as well. 

FN:   Out of all your creations, which one do you hold dearest to your heart? and why? 

EA:   I would say the ones I have being more honest with myself, not trying to convince anyone. But I have a very short career by the moment so for sure my favorites are the ones I haven’t already done. 

FN:   What is a day in the life of Ernesto Artillo, the artist?

EA:   My projects are always changing so my everyday life is quite different too but normally I like to wake up have a big good breakfast and then start working at my home/studio. Most of my friends have more tidy jobs in terms of timing so they always come around home when they finish and spend some time with me. I like to have a walk in the city, go to my flamenco dance lessons and  watch movies during the week. 

FN:   Your wildly brilliant cover for British Elle Collections has to be by far my favorite, how did that wonderful opportunity come to pass? 

EA:   Thank you. It was a surprise for me as well, they just wrote offering it, but what it was more surprising was that they give me plenty freedom to create. Suddenly this great picture by Bosch came across my mind, The garden of earthy delights, so I decide to make a fashion version of it for the cover.

FN:    Let's step into a time machine, if it were possible out of all the painters, sculptors and creatives minds that have surfaced throughout time...who would you choose to be your mentor?

EA:   I am very lucky because I already have two brilliant mentors in my life that I wouldn't change for the most important artist ever, they are my parents and they have given me a beautiful education based in love and freedom, everything I do is because of them.

FN:   If there wasn’t a word to describe your art, what would you name it? 

EA:   I would say my name, Ernesto. I don't want to give any other word the responsibility of supporting my work.

FN:   When would you say was the highest pinnacle of your career? 

EA:   It was very special when I exhibited my work  in Saint Petersburg , my first publications in international magazines or my first collaborations with designers, but I would say now because now is when I am enjoying the process of my work the most and because now looks closer to the future and is there in the future where I want to find my highest pinnacles.

All art shown here is by Ernesto Artillo