The Second Horizon at Berninneit

Artist Gonzalo Varela's exhibition "The Second Horizon" opened at Berninneit Art Gallery last week.

The exhibition is free and runs until May 17, and is a return to painting for multidisciplinary artist Gonzalo Varela.

His paintings in oil, acrylic, and mixed media, imagine future worlds built on the ruins of past societies.

Inspired by emerging AI evolutions, "The Second Horizon" flips the hierarchy between humanity and machines, and questions whether the post-human form represents evolution or extinction.

The result is an unsettling collection that challenges the boundaries between the real and the artificial, the biological and the synthetic.

Gonzalo says he approaches painting as part of storytelling and a slow creative process.

"I start from chaos and confusion in search of light and poetry. I believe humanity is lost only to find itself again."

Gonzalo was born in Argentina, where he studied art at the University of La Plata, where he later went on to teach.

He then worked in Barcelona for ten years with a collective art studio, before arriving in Melbourne in 2009 where he founded the Magic Lantern Studio with artist Lucy Parkinson. Gonzalo is now settled in Fish Creek, South Gippsland, where he has lived since 2019.

The exhibition is open from 9.30am - 5pm weekdays and 10am - 4pm weekends.

Happy Accidents Workshop

Gonzalo is also hosting a three-hour painting masterclass on April 11.
This workshop is suitable for adults and children over 16 years.

You will be working with ink and acrylics on paper. Materials are provided, but you are also welcome to bring your own water-based inks or acrylics.

Cost is $30 or $24 concession.

Gonzalo said the workshop explores how to control material (matter) by starting from irrationality and chance as a point of departure.

He says that through suggestive stains and spontaneous marks, participants will learn to discover hidden images and develop them, giving them character, intention, and form.

"This exercise, which I call "Happy Accidents," is an essential part of my creative process," Gonzalo explains.

"I understand chance not as a mistake, but as a trigger, a starting point that is later shaped and refined through conscious decisions.

From there, we will engage with fundamental principles of visual language such as balance, contrast, direction, light values, colour temperature, and their many variations."

To book: bccv.net/BookPaintingMasterclass