Transitions is new show at the city’s Oxmarket Contemporary
Transitions offers an exhibition at Chichester’s Oxmarket Contemporary from Christopher Cristóbal Newberry, who lives near Winchester (April 2-14).
Christopher explained: “My exhibition is a reflection of my ever-evolving work as an artist. It depicts different phases of my development. I’ve always been fascinated by patterns, symmetry, repetitiveness, cycles, change, progression. I use very intense colours which are very much influenced by my upbringing in Mexico. That’s almost instinctive. But my interest in truth, reality, perception and beliefs have been developing over the years, especially since the advent of the post-truth world.
“While I’m very happy to make pictures which are lovely and elicit a ne mo ti on,ip refer to pull at the heart strings with the neurons of the mind. That is, I want to incorporate a degree of objectivity. I photograph parts of reality – scenes, objects or people. A photograph is literally light that has bounced off reality and into the camera so I change this reality into either impossibly perfect images or into abstractions. Garry Kennard, director of Art and Mind, thinks that in my pictures ‘all aspects of the image are enhanced, from heightened colours to exaggerated symmetry to sharpened horizon sand outlines. All of this leads to an art which can transform our emotional perception of the material world.’ I agree with him.
“I’ve gone through several transitions which can briefly be described as: 1. Gestalt Blue Skies: In Gestalt theory, when we are presented with a partial view of an image, we complete the picture. we in vent the parts we can’t see. We give it meaning, regardless of whether it is true or not. 2. Platonic Views: Plato thought that our world was merely the shadow of another 'ideal', perfect world. The post-truth world presents us with simple, perfect, ‘ideal’ solutions to complicated problems. Like all ideals, they only exist in the mind and not in reality. 3. Lockdown: During the Covid lockdowns people were forced to look at their immediate surroundings and routines with much more time and attention. The Lockdown series consists of composite images reflecting the world at home or the mind. 4. Abstractions: Three-dimensional reality is turned into flat, abstract images using a limited palette of 22 colours. 5. Moon Shots: Every night, all over the world, no matter where one is, everyone sees the same moon. It looms over all humanity. Perhaps judging our follies.”
“I was born and brought up in Mexico City. I studied communicationsat the un iv er sid ad Iberoamericana. After completing my studies, I decided to travel hitchhiking in Europe. When a few months later I ran out of money, I went to London. Through a series of fortuitous circumstances I ended up working as a housing adviser in Notting Hill. Five years later my partner and I went to Mexico where I directed documentariesfor mexico’ s cultural television channels. I returned with my partner to London where I worked as a freelance photographer and designer. What influences me comes from a variety of sources, not just the world of art. from the art world, it would be Piet Mondrian, Picasso and Mark Rothko. However many of my ideas come from other sources.”