“Más o menos cuando menos es más” – Guatemala City, Guatemala
While most of us take language for granted as a method oftransmitting meaning, Ripo doesn’t let his audience get too comfortable withthe idea. In his aptly titled solo show at Barcelona’s Galeria Cosmo, “Don’tGet Me Wrong,” the artist subtly interlaces his vibrant mixed-media works witha variety of letters and symbols, putting the communicative power of words intoquestion. A New York native based in Barcelona, Ripo boasts a wide range oftext-based graffiti on the streets of Spain as well as in Albania, Brazil andChile—to name just a few of the numerous countries he has visited to paint.
“Muito Vivo (Really Alive)” – Sao Paulo, Brazil
Ripo’s latest exhibition combines controversial newsheadlines and vulgar expressions with an ornamental calligraphy style on paper,wood panel and canvas. The curvaceous abstract designs and hasty strokes of carmine and deep blue lend Ripo’s paintings a sense of motion, throttlinghis words away from their dictionary definitions and into the realm ofaesthetic objects. The artist works on surfaces that evoke the urbanenvironment of graffiti, like the crumbling brick wall he built in the centerof Galeria Cosmo. Many of Ripo’s artworks include mirrors and ambiguous phrases, leaving room to reflect each viewer’s interpretation. Nastia Voynovskaya of Hi Fructose surveys his works below.
