blue-black

"Black lives matter"
 
Blue-black is inspired by the racially-charged social unrest witnessed in recent times; heightened in the context of a pandemic.

Through the tools at hand in visual language, these formal works on paper illustrate a sentiment that translates into a free-falling of sorts, where the response has been an emboldened collective call to organize in the form of a "movement". 

A visceral need to be heard, a deaf cry. "I can't breathe". Blues become midnight blues, bordering on black; neighboring hues where glowing silhouettes are prey to the changing skies, a recurrent theme in Gambis' work. Oh the beauty, how misleading it can be!

The process is vigorous: layers upon layers of recycled paper, paint, glue, collage, gesso... resulting in the pieces' physical heaviness as if buried underneath the dense surface of the work were the stories waiting to be unearthed, calling upon the artist and the viewer alike to bear witness to it all.