I am taking the figurative to the edge, to the precipice

"I painted figures, but I was removing things and leaving them behind, I saw that what interested me was the light and how it passes through space"

Elena Fernández-Pello - La Nueva España, December 2020

Monica Dixon (New Jersey, United States; 1971) She is a master of space and light. Her handling constitutes a technical challenge for her and is the result of an inner reflection on existential labyrinths. Her most recent work can be seen until the 5th of February in the exhibition 'Espacios detenidos', in the art gallery Guillermina Caicoya in Oviedo. Soon, one of her paintings, "No easy way out", will hang in the rooms of the Museo Bellas Artes of Asturias.

- What does 'Espacios detenidos' evoke in that title?

It is what appears in the paintings, spaces stopped by light, silent, that are a shelter. It is what we are living now, that we are detained in time. It is a suggestive title.

- Your work is very recognizable and, at the same time, all your paintings are very different.

They are based on the same concept: the empty space, the non-places. Marc Augé has written a lot about it. It is the light that makes them different and gives each one his personality. I investigate through light and these geometries come out, which in turn create another new reality. They are on the border between figuration and abstraction.

- You have introduced color.

For going a little further. I felt like introducing a sphere, and with color or a coloured partition. I liked the idea of breaking away from this exhibition, which is very measured for the gallery space. There is no lonely house this time, I wanted a sober and powerful exhibition, and I'm very happy.

- Do you see yourself filling your paintings with color in the future?

In the solitary houses I use a different range of colors but I always see the interiors as moving from darkness to light, but there is a lot of degradation in the blacks and greys, and many shades. I always use brush and paintbrush, I never used spray paint or plan to do so. The drawing is very technical, and there is only acrylic, water, brush and paintbrush.

- I never paint characters.

There was a time when I used to put some figures in, but I kept taking things out and leaving them behind, until I got here. I've been working with the interior for years, but at the beginning it was full of things. Then I saw that what interested me was to paint the light and see how it passes through the places. We are all surrounded by geometry and we don't realize it.

- Is 'Stopped Spaces' the product of this year?

Everything is new, recent, from last year. Fortunately or unfortunately I have the studio at home and that allowed me to continue working, the loneliness and silence motivated me more.

- There is more than geometry.

There is the Zen concept of empty space, of no place. I tend to exaggerate, and the paintings seem almost abstract. I would like my work to invite reflection, about the life we lead, to silence, to stop a little, to imagine that one is there, sheltered, to philosophize about space and where we are going. My art is figurative, you don't have to decipher anything, you just have to look. I am taking the figurative to the edge, to the precipice.

https://www.lne.es/sociedad/2020/12/15/monica-dixon-llevando-figurativo-borde-26312929.html