'Messenger species': reflections on pollution and mutant nature

In a world where life is forced to adapt to the uncontrolled forces of pollution, 'Especies Mensajeras', by the artist Álvaro Soler-Arpa , invites us to contemplate a future as fascinating as it is disturbing. In this scenario, nature, perverted and transformed, adjusts in a strange and mutant way to a polluted environment. His sculptures tell us about impossible animals, the result of out-of-control genetic mutations, which become a distorted reflection of our destructive impact on the environment.

The exhibition can be visited in the Goya room of the Círculo de Bellas Artes in Madrid from October 9 until the end of January 2025, and represents a synthesis of more than fourteen years of work by the artist.

Drawing inspiration from the principles of evolution and playing with the boundaries between the real and the imaginary, Soler-Arpa presents creatures that seem to emerge from a dystopian ecosystem. Feathered elephants, hairy reptiles, ruminant amphibians or two-headed sloths challenge our understanding of what is possible. These sculptures, with tortuous but elegant forms, lead us to reflect on the destruction of biodiversity caused by pollution and climate change. The iridescent beauty caused by the radioactivity in their coats contrasts with the tragedy of a nature deeply altered by excessive human ambition.

Álvaro Soler-Arpa al seu taller.

Soler-Arpa's works are powerful metaphors for the future we are building. Fish contaminated with mercury and animals of a third sex with innovative shapes are manifestations of the impending ecological disaster. According to the artist, this distance from nature symbolizes the loss of our own spirituality, a void that progressively distances us from our natural environment, and which he denounces through his sculptures.

Álvaro Soler-Arpa, born in Girona in 1974, is an artist who combines his training in anatomy and drawing with a deep fascination for organic forms. After a career in advertising and cinema, where he collaborated with directors such as Woody Allen or Alejandro González Iñárritu, he devoted himself fully to the visual arts, focusing on the creation of sculptures and installations. His work maintains an obvious connection with nature, denouncing the devastation caused by humans and showing great interest in the consequences of pollution in the world around us.

In this exhibition, curated by Marian Boadas and supported by the Lluís Coromina Foundation, Greenpeace and the Plastic Pollution Coalition , Soler-Arpa's sculptures invite us to rethink our relationship with the natural world. At a crucial moment for biodiversity, his art becomes a wake-up call about the fragility of our ecosystem and the urgency of changing our habits of life and consumption. His creatures, though fictitious, become messengers of a future we can still avoid, as long as we take our collective responsibility towards the environment.

'Ojos', Álvaro Soler-Arpa