Manuel Mérida

Biography

Honored for its aestheticism and for its captivating effect on the viewer, and despite the marginalization of his work that we often like to associate with kinetics, the work of Manuel Mérida remains of no less importance in the history of art. - Hervé Mikaeloff

Manuel Merida, Venezuelan artist, born in 1939, moved to Paris in the 1980s. Trained at the School of Fine Arts in Valencia, Venezuela, he became one of the best representatives of the "informalist" trend. and the "gestural art" of his country. He works in the studio of Carlos Cruz Diez and practices in parallel the job of scenographer for theater, decorator for cinema and advertising designer for Christian Dior, Guerlain, Cartier, Chanel, etc.

Manuel Merida is one of the South American kinetic artists of the second generation. Through his work, the artist wants to avoid proposing a fixed and unique vision, playing with the variations of the colored matter (pigments, sand, coal powder, wood particles, painted metal, etc.) contained in his monochrome.

The works are always mobile. Of various shapes, sizes and colors, they are composed of boxes of square or circular shapes, protected by a glass plate, rotating around a central axis. They rotate abruptly by the hand of the spectator. The others, activated by an engine, move slowly.

Each movement generates a new unexpected monochrome. Organic matter is inverted creating forms renewed to infinity. Thus, Manuel Mérida uses the potentialities of chance to create a work in perpetual transformation. The images formed by the rotating material provide a soothing effect on the viewer watching them.

His work has been crowned with 14 awards and his works are in public and private collections around the world.

Works