José Luis López Galván’s Surreal Oil Paintings Utilize Techniques of Old Masters

Mexican artist José Luis López Galván works with oil paint to create dark and unsettling scenes that can be simultaneously erotic and grotesque. His paintings further estrange the viewer by calling to mind wildly different artistic styles, from the quietly dramatic chiaroscuro of Rembrandt to the surrealism of Dali. López Galván maximizes the dramatic potential of oils, creating lush and eerie tableaux that are populated by enigmatic characters, such as anthropomorphic and lavishly attired rabbits, disembodied limbs and half-human robots. As in paintings by the Old Masters, López Galván’s storybook-like scenes often feel like allegories for a larger narrative. In this case though, the background story resembles the logic of a nightmare or a hallucination more than the workings of the divine.