Juan Manuel Rodríguez
Xippas, Punta del Este (UY)
ArtNexus, #126 (June-November 2026)

The exhibition Amanecer infinito (Infinite Dawn) by Juan Manuel Rodríguez, curated by Manuel Neves for Xippas gallery in Punta del Este, presents a series of new watercolor works on paper that mark a turning point in his oeuvre. Rather than landscapes, these large-scale pictures offer a sensation of landscape outlined by a horizon line and a frame of vegetation. His previous oil-on-canvas works are characterized by a marked figuration, depicting everyday life and intimacy in the foreground, with sensual scenes set in interiors around beds and featuring male bodies. These new watercolors arrive as a breath of fresh air. Here, the artist has formulated a sensual and suggestive language in which water is the fundamental element.

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These pieces were created during his 2023 artist residency while pursuing a Master’s degree in Painting at the University of the Basque Country. The titles often provide the exact details of when the work was produced: date, place, and the times they were started and finished. This way, the artist seeks to reflect the act of painting as a ritual where presence is vital. However, the process and its temporality also hold value beyond the final outcome. In this pictorial act, the artist tries to shed his ideas and preconceptions –or, in more spiritual terms, his state of consciousness– to create a picture where emotions flow like streams of water softly tinting the sheet of paper.

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Landscape appears here as a mental construction; the memory of a landscape that feels both familiar and strange. These watercolors do not state, but rather evoke. Their power lies in suggestion, their language in a whisper. That is where their force and potency reside. There is no intention to imitate reality, but rather to suggest the idea of an archetypal landscape that exists in the memory of our retina.

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This exhibition is an exercise in observation. We must train our gaze to capture the richness and diversity of expression condensed in each piece. At first glance, what stands out is color and its gradations. The intensity of the skies, reaching fuchsia and orange tones, and the density of the vegetation in earthy colors, contrast with the mist and ethereal particles that hover along the horizon line.

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Upon closer observation, forms and the traces left by water on paper become apparent, revealing the pigment’s expansive capacities, as seen in Leioa, 28 de febrero de 2023 (Leioa, February 28, 2023). This leads us to a duality between presence and absence. Brushstrokes and stains generate subtle, vaporous forms with blurred edges, where the reference point appears more as absence than presence. We do not see vegetation, but stains; no sky or sun, but bands of color gradients. The elements themselves are not there; rather, it is their memory, their latency.

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The curator links this process –where water and pigment define form– to certain surrealist techniques, “where the artist would construct an image from the possible evocations suggested by amorphous stains.” Beyond this, the ethereal, misty atmosphere present in most of these works calls to mind ancient Chinese landscape painting (shan shui), executed calligraphically on long paper scrolls, where both the brushstroke and the void are equally important.

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Most of the works have a cheerful, positive tone, largely due to the expressive use of color. However, 18 de mayo, 14:40hs - 18:00 hs (May 18, 2:40 pm - 6:00 pm, 2023) has a more muted, autumnal character. Although it is spring in the northern hemisphere at that time, the palette feels somber and subdued. The same happens with 29 de marzo, 17:30 - 18:30 (March 29, 5:30 pm - 6:30 pm, 2023), which features more expressive, dramatic brushwork with vigorous, rapid strokes. Here, the suggestion of landscape changes entirely, as verticality dominates the composition, with what could be water plants or tentacles reaching upward toward what we might imagine is an aquatic surface.

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As is customary in the landscape genre, most of these works are presented in a horizontal format. There are exceptions, such as the aforementioned case and Sin título (Untitled) (2023 - 2025). The latter is also enigmatic within the exhibition: landscape loses prominence, and a multicolored circle appears in the foreground, like a rainbow. This is both a reference and a reverence to Goethe’s color wheel.

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In this privileged setting in the countryside, surrounded by greenery and with an endless sky, sunrises and sunsets seem to stretch out. These ethereal, delicate landscapes on paper broaden our perspective and invite us to transcend the image.