Gil Heitor Cortesao

Gil Geitor Cortesão’s paintings are an exercise in deconstruction; both in medium and content. By using the technique of “reverse glass painting”, the paradigms of painting need to be reconsidered. What is usually applied last, has to be done first when painting on glass, thus altering the whole process irreversibly. Opposing the softness of a regular canvas, neglecting the texture and olfactory qualities of the medium, Cortesão’s Plexiglas technique encourages a distance, and focuses on atmospheres instead of narratives. This “structural denial” of painting turns into one of its strongest advocates. His choice of subjects work along these lines naturally. By choosing “found footage” from magazines and books from the 60’s and 70’s, the concept of a “mediated reality” is empathized. A sort of very elastic, yet neutral structure, constantly oscillating between desire and destruction.

He has exhibited in institutions in Lisbon including CAM Centro de Arte Moderna and Fundacao Calouste Gulbenkian.

Courtesy of Carbon 12