本件作品,《鯊魚天使》,是納瓦對這一海洋生物的絕佳詮釋。長著四條腿、腮狀翅膀和一條尾巴,這個歪向一邊的捕食動物看起來好像是從積克與迪諾斯‧查普曼兄弟的《優美屍骸》系列中一躍而出,儘管納瓦所賦予的童真氣質讓它看起來不那麼恐怖。鯊魚的頭上漂浮著一個光環,與其尖牙形成一種並置。藝術家賦予它這一特徵,「好讓鯊魚看起來更像一個天使,從而褪去怪物的意味。」 iii
Robert Nava (b. 1985) is a contemporary artist based in Brooklyn, New York. Using a rough and
free-flowing hand, Nava recreates the innocent and unlearned art of childhood. His works are
“carefully done wrong,” subverting the rigid fundamentals of painting and conventions of
completeness that Nava learned as an MFA student at Yale University. Nava’s paintings often
feature imagined mythological figures and histories of the artist’s creation whose drama is
brought to life with the frenetic energy of the artist’s brush.