"I seek to take that exploration to a terrain where memory and experience mix, trying to capture something essential about how we exist and relate in the world." [2]
Andrés Fernández is a Colombian painter known for his large-scale oil paintings that explore memory, human interaction, and the emotional atmosphere of everyday spaces. His work recalls the likes of the impressionists and avant-garde expressionists in his depictions of both the public and private sphere. Through dark, rich tones and carefully constructed compositions, Fernández creates works visually reminiscent of the turn of the century and the postwar era, blending personal memories with anonymity in daily life. His paintings move between the intimate and the unfamiliar, examining how people occupy spaces and how memory manifests itself through images.
Fernández’s artistic foundation began in childhood, when he was encouraged to paint and model clay as a way to address his difficulty focusing in school. Art became a creative avenue for him to channel his focus, eventually shaping his future pursuit. He was more introverted than his peers, and became engulfed in his new passion, spending much of his time drawing and painting. Before dedicating himself fully, Fernández worked as a waiter at a brewery in Bogotá while photographing scenes and developing ideas for future paintings. Influenced by family photographs, he became interested in the relationship between photography and painting. These images of family outings, portraits, and the everyday became the foundation for his body of work.
Fernández’s artistic process explores the intersection between the figuration and abstraction. He often begins with photographs and uses them as references, exploring how a captured moment can be transformed into a painting. His work focuses on the interactions between bodies and the spaces they inhabit, and his technique is influenced by artists such as Francis Bacon, Antonio Saura, and Cecily Brown. Through this balance of memory, material, and the depiction of presence, Fernández approaches painting as a way of understanding the world and exploring the connections between memory, experience, and connection.