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JULIAN CLAVIJO
Public Artist - Painter - Sculptor
Paintings
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Back to Being
Oil on Italian linen (diptych)
210cmx 140cm e.a
2023
(Sold)
Mother-Earth is nature and clearly embedded in all that exists, but what about Mother-Love? If love had a face, it would be of an innocent quirky little girl, wondrous of all the possibilities to emerge and transform from the unexpected and unexplainable sweetness and joy that drives life itself blooming from within or the wariness to go without. In the same way as sweet as life emerging from the darkness, the subject emerges with a striped singlet, ribbons, lollies and fairy floss recalling Marie Antoinette’s symbols of innocuousness as a form of protest and expression of identity in current times.
Can I go out and play yet?
Oil on Canvas
185cmx 185cm
2021
(Sold)
Painted during the 260+ days of lockdown in Melbourne, Australia.
For children, 2 years of pandemic feels like (or it maybe is) a lifetime, where they had to be hiding at home because out there is an “invisible monster that attacks (and kills) people” (quote by my cousin’s daughter, age 4). No school time, no friends, no family, no biscuits with grandma, no birthday party this year, no birthday party next year, no runs to the playground, no ice cream truck, no street games, no cinema, no sting by a bee, no road trip, no camping, no stepping on dog poo, no beach days, no mud eating, no sandpit castles… sports? games? Play? no friends, again.
The world became a screen.Living in this way, the world can become dark, especially the internal world. When all we know of life suddenly gets taken away… I’m not a parent, but, how do you explain that to a little kid why they are locked down with so many prohibitions for so long? How do you explain that to an older kid? A teenager? When the exploration of the world, relationships and interactions and discovery are some of the most crucial aspects of the wholesome development as a healthy human being? This painting is the portrait of these times, the portrait of the 260+ days patiently waiting for the “invisible monster” to go away, raincoat and boots on-and-all ready to go out to play. Can I go out to play yet? Roses bloomed and died, and bloomed again, and died again. There he sits and awaits day after day, month after month, eating the biscuits that grandma sent him, sitting on the old chair in the fatigued darkness staring at the light… the light from a window where he can see the world standing still? Or is it the light of another flick on the screen…?
'2020 Australia'
Dedicated to the devastating Australian bushfires
Oil on Canvas
35cm X 55cm
2020
(Sold)
Environmentally (and socially) speaking what we are witnessing is a clear and loud mirror reflection of a fast-paced mass extinction as it happens. The 6th mass extinction and the only one caused by one of the species. These natural events generally happened by severe changes in the climate or rise or low in the levels of vital elements in the environment. But this one right here right now is seeing species and creatures being swept faster than never before, by the billions in a matter of months. Of course that the system we indulge in is politically incorrect but let's not forget that the sustainability of this planet is a global commitment that starts with the consciousness of each individual. Our next generation of little ones is staring at us while we literally stand and watch the planet burn. I feel ashamed to hand over the planet the way it is to the current generation of children. A planet where you check hazardous levels of pollution in the air before you step out the door, a planet where they can't go safely to school in terror of a shooting happening, a planet where we feed by food-like by-products, technology that is making us less social, ill and lethargic, and the list goes on. If we all think and act day by day with a purpose to leave this planet a bit better than we received it, I'm sure this will be a much better home for all of us.

Present and Somewhere in Between
Oil paint on Stainless Steel panels installation on internal lifts shafts
Lift 1: 950cmx 93cm
Lift 2: 560cm x 90cm
2020
(Commission)
This major private commission of a total of 13metres oil painting combined is my largest oil painting project to date. Painted on several stainless steel panels in the studio, these large painting took over a year to complete.
The Painting’s Journey’. This artwork can not be contemplated as a whole at once, but rather it slowly and romantically unveils itself as one travel up and down a lift. An oil painting of monumental scales (9m high) that sails upwards into the freedom of a child’s mind and into the kingdoms of imagination and islands of dreams. Then, to encounter oneself continuing in the cycle to the insightful journey within. This is part 1 of a private commission permanently installed inside a lift shaft.







The accelerated unsustainable pace of consuming and destruction that began with the industrial revolution, has accelerated the extinction of species by a thousand fold in the last 100 years. Not to mention the levels of pollution we have to endure in our air, soil, water and food. Time was and still is running out before we get to a point of no return. Let’s not forget that with or without us, the planet will recover, it doesn’t need us, but we do need it.
Lift n.2 of the travelling oil painting ‘Present and somewhere in between’ dedicated to the species that no longer exist because of us, and the ones that are almost gone, again, because of us.
