Eugenio Merino

EUGENIO MERINO, (Madrid, 1975).
"Deadball", 2011.
Patinated bronze.
Measurements: 27 x 19 x 27 cm.

We see here a skull with an overdeveloped skull, which takes the shape of a soccer. Inspired, with his usual sarcasm, in the cranial elongation that was practiced among the oligarchic classes of the most ancient cultures (as can be seen in the fossils of Paracas), Eugenio Merino slips here a sarcastic commentary on the mental reformatting that soccer has turned into a big business of technocrats and millionaires.

Eugenio Merino is, above all, known for the controversy he creates with his works: from the "Jaffar suicida" of the exhibition "Mondolirondo" in 2006, to the installation "Starway to heaven", passing through "Always Franco" (presented at ARCO) or "For the Love of Go(l)d". He began working in painting, with works of less content than the current ones (according to his own words, the turn in his career was due to boredom with the same processes and not feeling anything as a spectator of his own works). Showing his political work, typical of a creator who, conditioned by his time, transfers his social ideology to his hands and from there to the sculptural work that splashes the viewer (as it should be). With a degree in Fine Arts from the Complutense University of Madrid, he has had solo exhibitions at Unix Gallery (Houston, USA), Unix Fine Arts (New York, USA), ADN Galería (Barcelona, Spain), Jerome Zodo Gallery (Milan, Italy) and Louis 21 (Madrid, Spain), among other venues. He has had numerous solo and group exhibitions and has participated in a variety of art fairs, such as Volta NY, Volta Basel, ARCO (Madrid). Art Brussels, FIAC (Paris), Armory Show, Arte Fiera (Bologna), Art BO (Bogota), MACO (Mexico), Art Wynwood (Miami) and has exhibited at the MOCA Museum in Taipei and the BPS22 in Charleroi (Belgium).