Paper-Bag Prince (2019)

Paper-Bag Prince
Miami, Florida
4-8 December 2019

In his most recent series, ‘Paper-Bag Prince’, completed for Untitled Art Fair Miami with Beers London, the very act of painting with a wry sense of humor and self-awareness is readily referenced – and critiqued. There is similarly a desire to shirk autobiography for the non-sequitur and playful. And as such, the works tend to be bright, celebratory, even theatrical, with an underlying macabre or dark aspect. For Salgado, each exhibition provides an opportunity to extend elements of the painting beyond the canvas–an invitation into a world of colour, fantasy, and fun.

The works take aim at the art-world itself, which Salgado views as propagating artifice and insincerity. The works are critical of the very system that they are structured to function within. Salgado has adopted a decidedly Bohemian-vibe: absinthe bottles and curling puffs of smoke, to tell a story that seems part-storybook, part ahistorical, part cutting-edge contemporary. We see references to the act of painting itself, and a host of literary references, from C.S. Lewis to Tropic of Cancer. 

The works are exhibited alongside mobile sculptures by Berlin-based artist Sebastian Neeb.