Today we’d like to introduce you to Edgar Cano.

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
I began in the arts, sticking to my decision to continue that path due to the multiple jobs (mall security guard, cashier, restaurant, caricature artist) I did to earn a living previously. All those activities gave me the opportunity to appreciate and distinguish the enthusiasm that embraced me when I produced my first works, which even at that novice stage gave me a very complete satisfaction. Moving from working in other trades to just understanding a single path as a painter and drawer was a life decision.
As an art practitioner, I found it exciting to go to Veracruz University in Mexico. Even with few resources, I began to develop in the small, local world via collective exhibitions and a few individual shows in the middle of my career, learning and sharing my art among colleagues and great masters of tradition. It is worth mentioning that I began my studies at the age that most of my generation’s colleagues graduated. That certainly gave me the energy and motivation to maintain a more defined attitude and to work with discipline towards my artistic goals.
Since my graduation, I saw the future with more certainty, more confidence, regarding my art. Step by step, painting by painting, I began to get recognition throughout the academy, and then the home state — even national recognition. Thus, I soon obtained support, scholarships and awards, which helped me to contribute to the creation of more artwork that moved toward a more distinct and defined sense of realism.
From that moment, I was surrounded by various personal projects, people and institutions interested in supporting my production. Especially in the workshop La Ceiba Grafica in Xalapa, Veracruz, an institution with which I produced about two hundred lithographs over several years, next to Per Anderson, a lithographer of recognized trajectory.
From that point on, I do not try to say that it has been easy, but it seemed that the road was more settled; the processes of production of work, creation of exhibitions, teaching courses or workshops of drawing and painting, were only a matter of keeping pace. There is a saying which I think is fair to bring to light, “the difficult thing is not to reach, but to know how to maintain.” Especially in the arts, it is a battle of the day, not with the outside world but –in principle– with oneself. Currently, I have created almost twenty solo shows, in Mexico and abroad, and almost fifty group exhibitions as well. I feel that I “know how to maintain.”
Currently I’m Assistant professor of Art at NSULA, in Natchitoches LA, while I work wiht my artwork, I’m finishing nowadays a large scale painting project, supported by the Mexican Government framed by the National System of Art Creators (SNCA).

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It has never been an easy road, I am more connected with mistakes than with successes, with intent and will, and it is a necessity to continue despite all the adversity of a modern and distracted society. In arts, it is never a flat path, even if you have resources, although, of course, there are mechanisms, contacts, or networks that make the path more digestible. I consider the hardest thing is to reach audiences, and audiences that boost your process and trust your talent. There are very marked differences when art comes from a source where adversity does not exist, and instead there is complacency and comfort, it may seem that this type of art is sterile in my opinion.
I think the most complex path is in our mind, in the modern and deceitful way of seeing only the outside and not inquiring into our interior. If we conquer first what we are and where we want to go, it is possible that we have our own, built-in support for our artistic work.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
Mainly, I am a painter, drawer and lithographer, my specialty is to generate through those mediums in a visual way discourses and narratives that affect the viewer’s gaze in some sense, I seek to generate in them and in me a state of reflection and dialogue through my brushstrokes and drawings, I am interested in encouraging thinking, going beyond what is said or seen with the naked eye through the visual game that my works generate. In recent years I have been recognized for working in large formats, with a language that to a certain extent is uncomfortable or not at first glance, I make use on various occasions of the nudity and the rawness of my deepest thoughts. In relation to my work, I am proud because it has made its way into the contemporary world of the arts, maybe I am not the best known or popular of painters, but that does not affect the sense of my production. Also, I am very satisfied for every work that leaves my studio and finds the ideal space to dialogue with other works, with other audiences, this is undoubtedly, the greatest merit, to open ourselves to a society that is thinking and willing to find in my lines a unique and different language.
In the shows and the exhibitions my work is distinguished by that it breaks, the color, the format or the message implicit in it, leaves a memory in the viewer that in my opinion gives him a fresh and shocking perspective that invites him to slow observation and the generation of more questions than certainness.

In terms of your work and the industry, what are some of the changes you are expecting to see over the next five to ten years?
I see my painting in the next 5-10 years even more complex and reflective, at the same time also more playful and relaxed, I am interested even more in exploring the possibilities of matter. I am even attracted by different but moldable objects, that is in the field of sculpture, or the creation of projects that make use of space as a motive. Realism is no longer and will not be sharp and rigorous, although it is possible to return to an academic style in case of a given research. In my work I can notice that I do not follow the fashions of the moment, that I do not care, I follow my instinct and my personal interests in the current project. There will certainly be a change of script in the way I participate, and I relate to museums, galleries and collectors. At this moment I am setting a point of efficient professionalism that considers collectors, the consumer of the arts and public or private institutions as the goal to reach. It is an inseparable and necessary relationship.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.edgarcanostudio.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/edgarcanostudio/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100058651490021
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/edgarcanostudio