Topografía
Iván Carmona
Judge Patricia H. Clark Children and Family Justice Center
Modernist, monochrome sculptures convey nostalgia for an artist’s childhood in Puerto Rico.
Growing up in rural Puerto Rico, Iván Carmona was surrounded by idyllic beaches and the lush tropical rainforest of El Yunque, a mountain sacred to the Taíno people. Today, his brightly colored ceramic sculptures reflect that vibrant environment.
Having mixed buckets upon buckets of cement as a child while helping his father build their family home, Carmona was drawn to working with another adaptable material: clay. As with Topografía, he primarily uses coil building and pinch-pot methods to create his sculptures, giving them a textured surface. For their modernist forms and monochrome colors, he draws inspiration from Isamu Noguchi and Alexander Calder, both of whom he has admired since he first discovered them in his youth.
“The mountains and forests of Puerto Rico became sculptural constructions and swaying mobiles in my mind,” Carmona says. “A shape, word, texture, or color can activate potent memories, and this sense of nostalgia is key to a reading of my work. The sculptures are abstracted, they aren’t one-to-one representations. Instead, each emotional memory is passed through the sieve of Modernism, creating connections between my remembrances and recollections of the past and the timeline of art history.”
About the Artist
Based in Portland, OR, Carmona exhibits regularly in Oregon and elsewhere, and in 2020 was awarded a Hallie Ford Fellowship from the Ford Family Foundation. His works are in the collections of the Boise Art Museum, Jordan Schnitzer Family Foundation Collection, Portland Art Museum, and others.
About the Location
Judge Patricia H. Clark Children and Family Justice Center
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