Lena Laguna (Zurich, 1993) has grown up between Cadaqués, La Selva de Mar, the Barcelona neighborhood of Les Corts, Karlsruhe, and Basel. In each place, she has found her corner to do what she is passionate about: painting. For the past four years, she has been in Basel, where she completed a master's degree at the Institut Kunst Gender Natur. We speak with her after she received the Premi d’Adquisició i Residència granted by Piramidón Centre d’Art Contemporani, in the La Pau neighborhood, in the Sant Martí district, where she will do a residency next autumn.
How would you define yourself?
I'm a fairly curious artist because I started with painting, which is my foundation, but over time I've been trying more techniques, such as cyanotype, which is what I work with now. Therefore, I like to leave open the idea that I am a 'painter'.
How did you start?
My parents have always had painting as a hobby, and I was lucky enough to always have materials at home, such as drawings and books. My mother says I didn't start talking quickly like other children, but rather I drew. When we sent postcards to family, I would make drawings instead of writing. I was born in Zurich, but I grew up and lived between Cadaqués and La Selva de Mar and the Barcelona neighborhood of Les Corts. After secondary school, I studied Applied Arts at El Mur in Figueres and then in Olot, before moving to Germany, where I continued to study art. There I saw that they have a much greater tradition around sculpture and painting than in the universities of Barcelona. I currently live in Basel, Switzerland. When I started my master's degree here, I saw that there weren't painting workshops as good as those I had previously had in Germany, so I started doing ceramics. I immediately transferred painting to ceramics and also started working in a screen-printing workshop, where I was motivated to try another technique, cyanotype, which I also relate to my pictorial language.
What projects do you have in hand?
I am currently doing an artistic residency in Basel. At the end of January, I will be exhibiting in a group show at Villa Renata, and in March, I will participate in a fair in Rotterdam, as I have been invited by the BETA Contemporary gallery from the Gràcia neighborhood. Also, next April, I will have an exhibition as part of The Collector is Present festival with Fuga (l’Eixample), a space managed by Maria Costafreda and Anna P. Milán
Where have you exhibited your work?
My first solo exhibition in Spain was with the Malpaís space, in the Marina del Port, and from there I started participating in shows. It was also Malpaís that invited me to participate in the SWAB Fair, where I was awarded the Acquisition Prize for the piece Powerless to Describe and the residency at Piramidón Centre d’Art Contemporani, where I will go next fall. I'm very excited because I've never had my studio in Barcelona. The idea is to move there this year
What is the exhibition of your dreams?
Barcelona has many, like Bombon Projects, for example. I also like the Alegria gallery. I've followed the Fuga gallery from the beginning and I'm very happy to see how we're growing together. I like to think it's a city I don't quite know yet.
Who do you admire?
There is a painter who impresses me a lot called Ambera Wellmann, and in New York there is Nicole Eisenman, whose work with painting interests me. I also consider the Second School of Fontainebleau, the artistic school of the French Renaissance, as a reference.
