Double Chiaroscuro I, V, VI, VII

Based on a portrait of his great-grandfather found in the  J.R. Plaza Archive, Bonillas launches an investigation on the plasticity of the image: its ability to unfold and produce other fully differentiated images (almost like what happens in biological regeneration processes). By presenting an exact reproduction of the original photograph, the artist makes it clear that, in reality, we are always already dealing with duplicates. In this case, creation implies reproduction from the get-go.

The original portrait showed traces of a grid drawn over it in pencil (with the idea, most likely, of making copy by areas: A1, A2, A3, etc.), which is what inspired Bonillas to work not with the image as a whole, but with the 104 sections of the “cut out” grid. By renouncing the figurative quality of the original photograph in this way (and, therefore, the possibility of recognition), the artist is able to seek out different ways of ordering the group of small abstract images. At this point, though, the images are no longer strictly photographic; their nature is indiscernible enough to permit working with them from a neutral standpoint, trying out different methods and techniques.

It is worth noting that the original photograph was taken under such strange lighting conditions that two chiaroscuro effects were created accidentally: one on the subject’s face and the other, which is oriented in the opposite direction, in the background. This curious lighting phenomenon extended the grey scale considerably, allowing the artist to reproduce the double chiaroscuro effect over and over by organizing the 104 fragments according to tone.