Following a quick batido of mixed fruits and an empanadilla de pollo at the Mercado, we stopped at the spare, design-conscious home of Quintin Rivera Toro. The artist presented us with a few works from 2002 to 2009, including a series inspired by films and other that explores language, space and the human presence.
Around the corner from Quintin is the home/studio of Chemi Rosado Seijo, who discussed his most recent construction from found materials, a skate bowl-cum-swimming pool in the La Perla district of San Juan. The bowl has been featured in a number of magazines around the world and is a popular site for San Juan's skaters and for neighbors looking for a cool place to relax on the weekends, when the bowl is filled with water.
Finally, we visited with Melvin Martinez. The artist showed us a number of newer paintings, one of which he has re-started for the third time, having first covered it with pages from Artforum, then layered it with black paint and text and, finally, with a think impasto of silica gel, acrylic paint and glitter. The inscrutable canvases are a departure from his measured images of wallpaper-like desisgns but are just as palatable. A set of shelves in the back held an assortment of small sculptures of animals, toys, and other objects covered in thick layers of colorful paint and glitter--practically lickable.
At the very end, a visit to the Museo de Arte de Ponce, which has a branch at the local commercial behemoth, Plaza Las Americas. This was a fabulous collection of works, mostly paintings and a few scuptures, that ranged in date from the colonial period through the end of the 20th century. Next year, we will be making the trip to Ponce to see the striking Edward Durrell Stone building after its renovations and all of its fabulous contents.
