FANBOY: Saddo

We are pleased to present FANBOY a solo exhibition of works by SADDO.

On view is the artist's latest series, a complex portrait of cultural and social contemporary narratives explored in never exhibited before drawings, large scale paintings, tapestry and sculptures.

OPENING AND LIVE SHOW HIP HOP LA FEMININ - 2nd of October from 6 PM to 12 AM, at #18 Dumbrava Roșie street, Bucharest.

The exhibition is on display from 2nd of October through 7th of November.

Music is a personal experience. Maybe the most personal. It touches us like no other art form does, because it has this immediacy to it. You listen to it in your headphones, just you and the sound, and there's a very intimate fiction building up there, and it gives you access to a sound-emotion streamline, invisible to other people. Based on this premise Saddo started his series, Fanboy, sometime in 2017. Slowly the series grew and it became a visual playlist, including all the artists he liked at the moment, and three years later it became a visual kaleidoscope, a "plenty" that pays homage in an interdisciplinary way, to entities and personal heroes.

In a very POP register, Saddo not only creates pieces on this subject, but a whole ambient. It's something he truly likes, it's a very simple instinct at first glance, to create pieces based on subjects that simply attract you: the contradictory mix of rawness, gangsta culture, but also poetry, status assertion, social issues that lots of communities are still dealing with, criminality and opulence. The art pieces in the series have the feeling of totems or cult objects, not in a magical sense, but in a very real and heartfelt fascination for the subject. Translated in Saddo's stylistic trademark, you can clearly see the weight of this aesthetic, of the urban glam that stays hardcore because it's hard to fake.

Saddo's pieces abound in details, meaningful details with connotations essential for deciphering a cultural context and, zoom-in, the connoisseurs can find references to songs or defining elements for the musicians depicted; the frames surrounding the characters remind us of comic books: flowers, jewellery, cars, brand logos, snakes. They create a story and a complex setting reminding of Oriental miniatures or Orthodox icons (if only they were this much fun).

You can look at the project from different perspectives: maybe you're a fanboy/fangirl yourself, and you get these images of your idols as icons, and you leave with the satisfaction of a complex artistic experience. Or maybe you're just looking for the art and a skilful hand, but you also leave with some unexpected knowledge about people and music genres that you most likely haven't had the chance to encounter yet (less likely, but who knows?).

In a time in which manifesting your direct preferences can be totally uncool, Fanboy embraces it. I like this thing so much that I want to dedicate my time and mental space to it, and I'm gonna put my main skill into action to create something on this theme. I'm a fanboy and proud of it. Now that's powah and realness. Too often do we lack this kind of self-assurance essential for reducing the distances between us, as individuals, social and cultural groups, and for communicating by merging our personal playlists and finding a common streamline. As simple as that.

This project is part of the program aiming to support art galleries in Bucharest initiated by the Capital City Hall through the General Directorate of Landscape, Architecture and Public Monuments, and the Expo Arte Cultural Center.