For the eighth episode of our OnAIR series, we joined Rodrigo Ramírez in his studio in Mexico City as he gave us an inside look into the concept and inspiration behind his new body of works. The paintings of Ramírez depict the human body's struggle to contain the magmatic psychological energy within the boundaries of a crystalized identity. Deformed, torn, and in a perennial languishing status, they become alien to themselves, unable to reconcile the eternal conflict of minds and bodies. The matter-bodies embrace this conflict and produce endless possibilities of body representation, constantly deconstructing and destroying forms, limbs, and body boundaries. This perennial dichotomy between pleasure and pain animating our deeper desires is a liminal viscosity in which subjectivity disappears as the individual becomes alien to himself but free from painful conflict.

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How would you describe your current studio? Where do you find yourself working most often?

“It’s usually messy and chaotic. In general I try to find order in the works colliding with that mess. I always feel I need more space. Sometimes I find a moment to organize and feel a moment of calm. I like the tension between chaos and order.”

Rodrigo Ramírez Rodriguez (b. 1988) *Perpetuamente En Podredumbre; Despertamos Lástima Cultivando Las Heridas Más Repulsivas (Perpetually In Rot We Aroused Pity By Cultivating The Most Repulsive Wounds)*, 2024, Oil On Canvas, 71 H x 154 W in. / 180 H x 390 W cm.

Can you tell us a bit more about your practice and how its evolved over the past years?

“My work is related to these foldings made by the matter or layers in the painting, which is obviously related to the Baroque, also to something very important to me, which is the idea of cannibalism. For me, things are always devouring themselves or devouring us. Not knowing where our body ends and where another body begins. The matter itself, including the materials, the work or the paint, can become another body.”

Rodrigo Ramírez Rodriguez (b. 1988) *Perpetuamente En Podredumbre; Yo Es Otro, Todo Lo Que Vino Antes De Mi (Perpetually In Rot; Me Is Another, Everything That Came Before Me) I*, 2024 Oil On Canvas, 51 H x 71 W in. / 130 H x 180 W cm.

Is there anything you like to listen to/watch/read/look at for inspiration?

Some philosophers and poets. Pascal Quignard or Kathy Acker recently. Obviously Gilles Deleuze. In general it is really erratic and diverse what I use for inspiration. I love music but I usually don't use it as inspiration. Probably in an emotional-physical way but not conceptually. Probably just Olga Neuwirth or in certain moments baroque music.