Untitled (Land Studies) III

In the series "Untitled (Land Studies)", Lui Medina continues to interrogate form and figure taking landscapes, not only as subject but also as a framework. These graphite works are imaginary maps which question landscape representation and the limits of figuration. For to represent a landscape in painting is to be able to grasp the vastness of the natural world while having to flatten its expanse into an image. Medina "imagines landscapes not to determine them as extricated objects of study but to render them plastic as evolving instances of relation [...] By devising new territories out of insular and continental imagery, the artist seizes the island from its conception as a geographical feature to its effect as an allegory that accounts for the hints and contradictions of subjectively experiencing a sense of place." (Abril Cisneros) Her portrayal of topographies are thus both imagined and real for according to the artist, "My works are entirely real places. To imagine an island is to know it otherwise." The approach Medina takes in devising new territories out of composite sources and imagery are allegorical portrayals of landscapes that poetically represents but also presents the contradictions of our sense of place.