Jorge Salas

Jorge Salas is a Venezuelan postwar and contemporary sculptor, born in La Grita, Táchira, in 1954 and based in Miami, Florida. Best known for his abstract constructivist style, he builds intricate three-dimensional works that explore spatial relationships, texture and geometric balance, relying on the combination of contrasting natural materials, primarily wood, stone, marble and travertine.

In 1973 he entered the School of Architecture at the Central University of Venezuela (UCV) while studying painting with Professor Ángel Boscán. He left the UCV for the Cristóbal Rojas School of Plastic Arts in Caracas, where he took courses in painting and sculpture. His first exhibitions, in the late seventies, raised great expectations for his work as a sculptor, and he formed part of the avant-garde group El Búho que masca chimó with three other sculptors. From that time his work has been characterized by close attention to the treatment of the surface, producing reliefs made by assembly and construction. In 1995 he completed internships at the marble laboratory in Pietrasanta, Italy.

His work follows two tendencies. The abstract constructivist pieces, generally larger, result from the construction of segments juxtaposed by alternating wood and stone to form a visual unit. The second body of abstract work arises as a material unit, a volume of marble on which he writes and constructs from geometries and textures, yielding multiple readings as a kind of document in stone.

Among other recognitions, Salas received the Vicson Prize and the University of Carabobo Prize at the Arturo Michelena Salon in Valencia, in 1977 and 1981, as well as the Francisco Narváez National Prize. His work is held in important public and private collections, including the Museum of Latin American Art (MOLAA), the Andean Development Corporation (CAF) and the Museum of Contemporary Art of Caracas. On an urban scale, his pieces stand in El Paseo Vargas in Caracas, at the Mario Abreu Museum in Maracay and at the Luisa Cáceres de Arismendi Road Museum on Margarita Island.