“Ogbön” : Shie Moreno

Book Signing and Exhibition

We are delighted to welcome Shie Moreno to Conde Contemporary.  Moreno will be signing copies of his beautifully crafted book "Ogbön" and exhibiting a carefully curated selection of his work, Friday, September 25th, from 7:00 - 10:00 pm. The body of "Ogbön" includes forty paintings created between 1999 and 2014, by Shie Moreno, laid out to give viewers an insight into the painter’s varied styles and techniques. Abstract paintings are displayed alongside figurative images that radiate energy and inspire viewers to explore perceptions of female empowerment, energetic realms. Conde Contemporary is located on historic Calle Ocho in the heart of Little Havana, 1007 SW 8th St., Miami. Please RSVP to Stacy@CondeContemporary.com

About the Artist : Shie Moreno

Shie Moreno’s early years were spent in a Havana society in the throes of a Stalinist period amid the decaying splendor of a once grand city. At 8 he endured a crowded, nightmare passage forever known as the Mariel boatlift. He arrived in a hostile city to a foreign culture. The family quickly moved to Los Angeles and then, years later, returned to Miami. The harsh bright light of the tropics, the intensity of color, the forced blindness of night in a crowded vessel, the elements, the sense of drifting and of place, all served to forge the sensibility of an artist. A fascination with iconography, calligraphy and the strength of titles is also evident in the artist’s work. He strives for the clarity of “morning water drawn from an undisturbed spring.” The phrases and deeper meanings of Yoruba spirituality as lived by the Lukumi sing throughout his life. A sense of command comes from “the proposer who wields the sceptre” and “the owner of rivers and life”. Marrying the strength of titles and the formalism of calligraphy Shie Moreno brings dust to life with the breath of a divine creator in the form of pigment to canvas or other media on the surface to hand. The artist has summoned forces and unleashed them as animating spirits, elementally free and giving freely. Shie Moreno is a living tendril connecting ancient spirituality, the fecund tropics and contemporary American art. The artist is not hindered by material constraints; any surface and material will do for creating expression. Paint, collage, tar, marker, wax, aerosol, keepsakes and even fire will be used to create a surface effect on canvas, wood, paper or glass. An earnest examination of color, letter forms and composition inform the work. This leads to Shie Moreno as an inventor of forms, ever expanding the techniques and range of his expression. He is a superb draftsman with an organic sense of color who chooses to work in the forms he creates. Early series reveal his skill at drawing as well as his wit. As an example is his graphite and mixed media work where the half portrait of an elegant woman looks like a manipulated photographic image but is entirely drawn by hand. Any artist, particularly one as attuned as Shie, is also an instrument subject to the confluence of diverse energies; cultural, geographic, temporal and those not subjugated to the constraints of time.