FAVELAS - Florent Espana

THE FAVELAS PROJECT 2008/2021

Depuis 2008, plus de la moitié de la population mondiale réside en milieu urbain ; un milliard d’entre nous vivant au cœur des zones insalubres, bidonvilles, campements de fortune ou friches périphériques en marges des villes. Les urbanistes estiment qu’il y aura 5 milliards de citadins en 2030.
Florent Espana travaille sur l’esthétique de l’accumulation, en lien direct avec le milieu urbain. Un monde dont les dédales des favélas expriment la densité, à l’instar de la superposition de couches de peinture de ses toiles, motifs complexes inspirés par Jackson Pollock, Marck Rothko, Joan Mitchell, Jean-Paul Riopelle.

«The work of Florent Espana has always been oriented towards the human being. For him, it is necessary to represent his environment: traumatic, dense and sometimes, apocalyptic. Dencity (Favelas) is the title of his series focused on the favelas and slums of the world. This series of urban paintings almost abstract, is also a reflection focused on the future of our societies. His painting, poetic, but also politic, becomes the expression of a density which reached its climax. There is something hysterical in this endless accumulation which takes place on his canvas. Florent Espana exposes us to the heights of our society , where the gap between social classes becomes increasingly large, where the place of birth is a sign of destiny, where sometimes the only space to breathe is the sky. His thinking is intrinsically linked to the history of art, which constantly feeds his work with rich references, varied and passionate.»