Jerónimo Rüedi »Khōra«

Despite his virtuosity Rüedi welcomes the unintentional and unexpected. In the tradition of automatic drawing his scribbles are not generated by design. They contain something of the indiscriminate irregularities of William Anastasi’s Subway Drawings, but without the jerky urban intensity, and the subconscious dismantled representation of Joan Miró, less the primitive animism. Teetering on the verge of taking permanent form, Rüedi’s markings are transitory, like bonfire sparks in the dark, or the trail of a meandering snail on a rock and the erratic motion of a glass on an Ouija board.

His process is closely connected to both the philosophy and the practice of meditation. Following John Cage’s dictum of getting oneself out of the way Rüedi aims to allow things to manifest themselves whilst intervening as little as possible. The paintings can be understood as an attempt to observe cognition before it becomes crystallised thought; conception before language.

Following a process of change and impermanence Rüedi’s paintings are in a constant state of coming into being. Each painting is an apparition taking form. Each suggests an attempt to capture smoke.

Jerónimo Rüedi has been based in Mexico City since 2015. He was born in Mendoza, Argentina in 1981 and studied in Escola Massana, in Barcelona, Spain. Before moving to Mexico City he lived in Berlin, Germany.

In recent years, Rüedi has been a resident artist of the Museo Experimental El Eco, taken part in the XVIII Painting Biennial at Museo Tamayo and produced stage scenery for the play Jazz Palabra by Juan José Gurrola (Casa del Lago, Mexico City / LA Theater Center, Los Angeles, California). His work has been exhibited in the MUAC Museo de Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico City, the Museum of Contemporary Art of Oaxaca (MACO) and Museo Tamayo. He recently published two books, The Stuff dreams are made of (2017, ed. Macolen) and Colorless Green Ideas Sleep Furiously (2020, Gato Negro Ediciones). As a result of his growing interest in the relationship between image and language, both volumes complement and shed new light on his pictorial work. He is one of the co-founders of Aeromoto, the public library for contemporary art and culture in Mexico City.