Blending her Mexican heritage with elements of street art and the fine arts, Goya Torres is one of the most exciting artists currently working out of Australia.
A key feature in Torres’s work is humanity’s relation with and impact on the work. Take Sea Introspection, for instance. Part of a three image series that looks at surfing as a state of mind, Torres replaces the subject’s face with a beastly mask to further impress his connection with nature. The head is haloed, denoting enlightenment.
The Endangered series is a more confronting look at the negative impact humans have had on their world. Torres employs a surrealist style in these works that give the at-threat animals a certain majestic, and yet vulnerable quality.
Death is a pervading theme in Torres’s collection, with the use of skulls a clear reference to Mexican folk art. She does not reject a fear of dying but, rather, embraces it in her work.
“Is not the concept of death that attracts me when I paint, instead is the concept of beginning and end of life, of renaissance and balance of energies, the contrast. I believe this equilibrium is in all of us. Fear of death is one of a kind feeling/worry that we all carry as humans, no matter race, age, sex, etc. To not live forever seems to be the biggest worry of human kind, but nothing (absolutely nothing) is forever, and we should see death as not only as the end but also the beginning of live, progress, movement, growth. I don’t paint skulls because it’s a current fashion, but because it represents a world as significant as life itself, because it’s also in the core of human life and any single creature on earth: to live, to give and to pass on. Only dead you might be remember forever, they say,” Torres writes on her website.
Outside of traditional canvas, Torres has been involved in a range of collaborations. She pained a life-sized rhino as part of Taronga Zoo’s Wild! Rhino Project, and earlier this year put on a live-painting experience as part of the Australian Open of Surfing on Manly Beach, Sydney.
If you are interested in buying one of Torres’s work, you can find the details on www.goyatorres.com. If the originals have already been sold, Torres sells reproduced copies, meaning that if you like something, it can be yours!