Why can vegetation be thought-about native to multiple nation whereas individuals can’t? This line of inquiry grounds a large-scale exhibition by Raul De Lara through which he presents his surreal sculptures that merge flora and furnishings.
HOST, on view now at The Contemporary Austin, brings collectively a group of works that decision into query belonging and id and rejects the concept state borders are mounted and pure. Utilizing wooden endemic to Texas and Mexico, De Lara sculpts potted monsteras sprouting from chains, a schooldesk lined in lengthy spines, and a cactus disguised as a toddler’s rocking horse.
The ensuing items translate what needs to be a standard object—a shovel, for instance, or an unlimited cluster of daisies in a vase—into the unusual and uncanny. Many works are additionally rendered unusable, together with a spiked ladder even the bravest amongst us would hesitate to climb.
Now based mostly in Ridgewood, Queens, De Lara grew up close to Austin as a toddler of Mexican immigrants. He first realized woodoworking in his household’s store, which he describes as “a world the place every device has its personal language, every bit of wooden reveals the passing of time on its pores and skin, and the place one is ready to talk by their fingers.” A robust perception in animism, luck, and the paranormal pervaded this sacred area and taught the budding artist that he may harness the vitality of a specific materials to create stunning objects.
At present, he sees woodworking as a mode of storytelling, one through which magical realism thrives. “I welcome the concept artworks can maintain their very own spark of life and lengthen it to us,” De Lara says, including:
Once I make my work, I bear in mind childhood reminiscences of once I would see native carvers flip branches into saints. I at all times puzzled at what level in
the carving course of does the ghost enters that piece of wooden. I try to make works that invite a sure form of belief and acceptance from the viewer, that permit them reside with out our realm.
As international considerations about immigration and human rights intensify, De Lara’s work is all of the extra related. The artist has DACA standing and is aware of firsthand the precarity and swift change that comes with a brand new administration.
lacquer, 72 x 24 x 50 inches
His sculptures seize a way of caprice and play that may appear in opposition to this actuality, however for De Lara, woodworking, and conventional craft extra broadly, is a superpower. “It can’t be taken away from you as it’s not tied to location, politics, or legal guidelines. You carry it with you and may follow wherever, with anybody, and oftentimes, it disarms variations amongst us,” he says.
See HOST by January 11, 2026. Sustain with De Lara’s work on Instagram.
