Artist of the day: Artist of the day, December 12: José Manuel Castro López, Spanish sculptor

Wednesday, December 12, 2018

Artist of the day, December 12: José Manuel Castro López, Spanish sculptor

José Manuel Castro López is a Spanish sculptor who creates impressive artworks carved out of stone. The sculptures appear like they’re made of a soft material like sponge, but López actually uses various types of stone, including quartz and granite. The unique pieces feature smooth textures and wrinkles that seems to be defying the laws of nature. They are made out of natural materials like granite and iron oxide, from which he crafts his rock-like formations with folds, wrinkles and flaps as if they were made of clay or skin, as in his “Faces” series where smiling and grimacing human faces are carved out of the solid material. Providing some of the stones’ fleshy appearance, one could say they almost appear to be alive.

López achieves this magical effort, he says, “with technical, ingenuity and work. Day by day, you’re discovering things and you open possibilities. This happens to all of us in our work. This is carved. I never use glue.” López doesn’t see rocks in the same way that other people do. Inspired by the mythology of his native Galician culture, he believes that stones are spirits of the land and, as an artist, it is his role to to conjure them: “My relationship with the stone is not physical, but magical. It recognizes me, it obeys me… we understand each other. My stones are not lifeless. They manifest themselves.”

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