Circus Boy

Juan Bolivar (1966 - )

Acrylic on canvas

2003

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  • About the work
    Location
    Country: UK
    City: London
    Place: Government Art Collection

    All is not what it seems in this painting by Juan Bolivar. Circles, triangles, diamonds and rhomboids in bright saccharine colours, are scattered randomly over the canvas. Viewed more closely, the shapes reveal a human face. At the top corners, two black circles with inset diamond shapes stare out like harlequin eyes; the red central circular shape resembles a clown's nose; and the jagged blue shape along the top fringes the face like hair. Each shape appears to be momentarily suspended in the middle of a juggling act. Bolivar has likened this visual metaphor to the spiral of 'The Snail', the famous collage by Henri Matisse of 1953 in the Tate. 'Circus Boy', painted as part of Bolivar's postgraduate degree at Goldsmiths College, London, is one of several playful paintings in which he has created faces from a repertoire of abstract shapes, a process that he calls 'faciality'.

    Juan Bolivar was born in Caracas, Venezuela, and studied at St Martin's College of Art in London from 1985 to 1988. He graduated from Goldsmiths College in 2003 and was awarded the Warden's Purchase Prize. His work has been shown in several exhibitions in London, Edinburgh, Bath and Venezuela, and since 2001 he has curated a number of exhibitions in London. Some of his recent paintings were exhibited in 'New British Painting 2' at the John Hansard Gallery in Southampton in spring 2004.

  • About the artist
    Juan Bolivar was born in Caracas, Venezuela, and studied at St Martin’s College of Art in London from 1985 to 1988. He graduated from Goldsmiths College in 2003 and was awarded the Warden’s Purchase Prize. His work has been shown in several exhibitions in London, Edinburgh, Bath and Venezuela, and since 2001 he has curated a number of exhibitions in London.
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  • Details
    Title
    Circus Boy
    Date
    2003
    Medium
    Acrylic on canvas
    Dimensions
    height: 226.00 cm, width: 192.50 cm
    Acquisition
    Purchased from the artist, London, November 2003
    Inscription
    verso centre (on stretcher bar): J.B 03
    Provenance
    the artist
    GAC number
    17851