José Carlos Balanza He has participated in many group exhibitions, both in Spain and abroad, and has had more than sixty solo exhibitions. A recurring theme in Balanza’s work is time as a concept and measure. Other references in his work are space, language and limits. Drawing, which he uses to trace the line of his own existence. Concepts through which he develops a discourse that relates his artistic process, his own existence and his understanding of and with the world. He uses a variety of media and techniques to create his artworks: drawing, painting, sculpture, photography, video, embroidery, performance, sound, words and more. Sculpture has played a major role in Balanza’s work since the beginning of his artistic career, using iron as his main material; a material that seems to lend depth to his artistic-existential process, like it does in the pieces of his Tiempo de Luz (Times of Light). The works in Tiempo de Luz are the result of the process of writing La Distancia (The Distance, a book published by Ediciones del 4 de agosto in December 2014). The connection between the text of La Distancia and the pieces in Tiempo de Luz allows them to share concepts and objects. His work is represented in different collections and museums. He also has sculptures installed in several public places. Project. I think of each of these works as a response: the diction I give through what I am and through the shape and substance of sculpture. The result of this relationship is the sculptural space, which I strip of the dense materiality of the iron that forms it in order to liberate the space in which the sculpture is inscribed, the space that can be traversed by light. To achieve this result, which is exact and different for each of the sculptures in Tiempo de Luz, I correlate the dimensions (the volume) and weight of the sculpture with the density of the iron (7.87 kilograms per cubic decimetre) and this product with light and its constant (300,000 km/s, the speed of light) using the formulas (d=m/v) and (v=e/t), interpreted using the poetics of art.
Logroño 1958
In 1984 the Regional Ministry of Culture of La Rioja acquired a work by Balanza at the V Biennial of La Rioja (despite the fact that he had already made some public appearances, this could be considered the beginning of his artistic career; a turning point which was to be followed by other awards and acquisitions in different national competitions).
BALANZA
