Claudio Bravo’s work is characterized by richly saturated colors and striking likenesses inspired by the paintings of Old Masters including Diego Velázquez and Caravaggio (Italian, 1571–1610), and he enjoyed great success as a portraitist in Madrid, where he moved in 1961 from his native Valparaiso, Chile. His paintings of high society gave him financial stability, but it was his so-called package paintings from the late 1960s that earned him international acclaim. He was drawn to the abstract qualities of real objects and elevated the everyday—such as disposable packaging paper—to the realm of fine art. In Red Paper, he convincingly evokes three-dimensionality in a closely cropped detail of a folded sheet of bright crimson paper. Demonstrating a skillful mastery of light and shadow and a delicate treatment of textiles, Bravo’s work toes the line between representation and abstraction.  

Label from The Swindle: Art Between Seeing and Believing, May 26–October 28, 2018