Angel Otero

Time and Time and Time Again

$175,000

2022

Oil paint and fabric collaged on canvas

213.4 x 152.4 x 3.8 cm / 84 x 60 x 1 ½ in

217.5 x 156.5 x 7.6 cm / 85 ⅝ x 61 ⅝ x 3 in (framed)

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Highly textural in composition and powerful in color, ‘Time and Time and Time Again’ (2022) is an outstanding example of Angel Otero’s experimentation with the materiality and possibilities of paint. Layers of textural blue, yellow and orange patterns fade into vivid purple and pink, as etched lines traverse the canvas, revealing yellow and copper tones underneath, forming a resolutely abstract and rhythmic painting.

Otero’s captivating abstractions are rooted in personal experience and art historical reference. As curator Valerie Cassel Oliver observes: ‘[Otero’s] work oscillates between the instinctual frames of nostalgia and memory and the immense gesture of painting.’ [1] He harnesses early memories from his childhood as the springboard for his works, from objects and spaces in his grandmother’s home in Puerto Rico to canonical paintings he encountered in books. Speaking about the artists he references, Otero clarifies: ‘My plan is not to get at what each individual artist or work means to me; it’s a formal decision more than anything else. For me, it’s like the way I choose a paintbrush—it’s a kind of tool that I’m reactivating in my own language.’ [2] Accordingly, in his work, Otero does not reveal these sources directly; instead, he collapses and collages them to create something that is simultaneously a historical facsimile and an entirely new creation.

Otero’s nuanced and complex methods underscore the skill and aesthetic sensibility that defines his practice. To create ‘Time and Time and Time Again,’ Otero laid down representational imagery in oil paint on plexiglass—in this instance, he references works by Pablo Picasso and Willem de Kooning. He then covers his initial composition with gestural, thick layers of oil paint, building up the surface of the work. Otero describes this method as ‘painting in reverse.’ He explains: ‘First I paint the scene, then I cover it with the background.’ [3] Here, while the paint is still wet, he scratched another referential work—a Picasso etching—into its surface. He then waited for the medium to partially dry and scraped up its solidifying surface layers. The paint ‘skins’ Otero creates during this process are reconstructed onto the canvas, yielding a complex and vibrant compositions that demonstrates the physicality of oil paint in an idiosyncratic way.

Accordingly, ‘Time and Time and Time Again’ is a testament to Otero’s remarkable ingenuity and mastery of his medium. This highly exploratory and creative approach to painting positions the artist among the most innovative and important artists of the present day.

Angel Otero was born in 1981 in Santurce, Puerto Rico, where he resided until moving to Chicago in 2004, where he received his MFA at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Otero is known for employing highly innovative techniques that challenge the parameters of his materials, revealing the intrinsic qualities of paint. His works are rooted in abstract image making and engage with ideas of memory through addressing art history, as well as his own lived experience. Otero is well known for the ‘oil skin’ works he began in 2010, an ongoing series that demonstrates the inherently transformative nature of the artist’s practice as well as his dedication to expanding the visual field of abstract expressionism.

Otero’s work is in numerous public and private collections including the Berezdivin Collection, Puerto Rico; Bronx Museum of the Arts, Bronx NY; DePaul Art Museum, Chicago IL; Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art, Kansas City MO; Long Museum, Shanghai, China; Margulies Collection, Miami FL; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago IL; Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park KS; North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh NC; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York NY; UBS Art Collection, Chicago IL; and the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond VA. Solo exhibitions of his work have been held at prominent institutions, including the Bronx Museum of the Arts, Bronx NY; Contemporary Art Museum Houston TX; Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno, Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain; SCAD Museum of Art, GA; and Contemporary Art Museum, Raleigh NC.

About the artist

Angel Otero was born in 1981 in Santurce, Puerto Rico, where he resided until moving to Chicago in 2004. He currently splits his time between New York and Puerto Rico. In 2009, Otero was included in the exhibition ‘Constellations’ at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, shortly after receiving his MFA at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Learn more

1.) Verlie Cassel Oliver, Terry R. Myers, Christian Viveros-Fauné, ‘Angel Otero. Everything and Nothing,’ Houston TX: Contemporary Arts Museum Houston and Skira, 2017, p. 13.

2.) Angelo Otero quoted in Taylor Dafoe, ‘Act First and Then Think: Artist Angel Otero on How to Turn Failure Into Fuel for Creativity,’ artnet news, April 19, 2019 (accessed April 28, 2022, https://news.artnet.com/art-world/angel-otero-turning-failure-into-creativity-1511446).

3.) Verlie Cassel Oliver, Terry R. Myers, Christian Viveros-Fauné, ‘Angel Otero. Everything and Nothing,’ Houston TX: Contemporary Arts Museum Houston and Skira, 2017, p. 28.