Joan Belmar

J O A N B E L M A R

My art is designed, in an abstract way, to examine social structures, and those who struggle within them, including myself, to the critical eye of the outsider.

A constant in my art has been the importance of circles—be they mandalas, the circle of life, or portholes through which we see both others and our inner selves. During the last 2 years, I have been experimenting with the properties of modern materials, such as plastic, acetate, polycarbonate, Mylar, and glass, to create optical effects. My art has also acquired sculptural qualities. I have been working exclusively on three-dimensional pieces—maybe only an inch or two thick—using Mylar and acetate to create layers within the internal space. The use of these transparencies and 3D technique has suited my purposes perfectly. I subject them to various conditions and elements to give them just the effect I am looking for. I create worlds where the viewer is allowed to see some things clearly, some things opaquely. But all things seen are intended to reflect an outer and inner world of psychological stress, fragility and dislocation. I have come to recognize that my art is tending more and more to show the influence of Op art and minimalism.

"Duplex Green"

Biography

Belmar, born in 1970, grew up 2 hours south of Santiago, Chile.

Left Chile for Ibiza, Spain, at the age of 24. He began painting professionally in Spain, using the Catalan “Joan” for his first name John. He came to Washington, D.C. four years later in 1999, and was granted permanent residency in the U.S. based on extraordinary artistic merit in 2003.

Joan Belmar in his recent work he has created a unique technique of 3-D painting, which combines his former painting and collage techniques with painted and untreated Mylar and acetate strips in circles and curvilinear shapes placed perpendicular to a painted background and then covered again (not always entirely) with a lightly frosted Mylar that produces changes in transparency as light and the viewer move in relation to the work. This new work has attracted the attention of many art consultants and curators and collectors in DC: he has been asked to exhibit in WPA\C venues, has contributed successfully in many charitable art auctions; and is included in the DC art bank.

Joan Belmar has shown widely, not only in the metropolitan DC area, but also in Chicago, New York, and internationally in Europe (Athens, Barcelona, London, Ibiza, Biella, Lisbon, Sevilla, Santander, Bologna, Malaga, and Rome), in South America (Buenos Aires and Santiago), and in Asia (Seoul). He work is in the permanent collections of the DCCAH Art Bank, the Wilson Building, and the Airport Art Collection, Ibiza Spain, as well as many private collections.