Dani Buch: “I envision a nocturnal Barcelona, yet at the same time lively and festive”
El pasado mes de noviembre, el proyecto NN Wallery de nuestra área de #sostenibilidad volvió a dar vida a las calles de #Barcelona. Esta vez, el artista Daniel Buch fue el encargado de dejar su huella en la persiana del parking de la calle Marquès de Sentmenat, 54 plasmando allí su visión de la ciudad. Con esta última intervención ya son 27 los artistas que han participado en el proyecto, destinado a mejorar el entorno de las personas a través del #arteurbano. Un proyecto original y pionero que sigue creciendo, y que suma 11 actuaciones efímeras y 18 permanentes.
Born in 1976 in Sant Gregori (Girona), after various experiences in the world of advertising, Buch has developed as a painter, illustrator, sculptor, and printmaker. Always linked to the world of #art, he studied graphic design at La Massana, where he began to experiment with the limits of reality through various supports and materials. In turn, he has created his own universe that leads those who observe his creations to a relentless questioning of the boundaries established by our senses.
Buch explains to us that he experienced the transition from the world of advertising to the world of art in a natural way: "I started painting murals as a freelancer, and from there I got more projects for setting up establishments, and later on, in galleries, both locally and internationally."
Although he has exhibited in galleries and group shows in Brussels or Berlin, Buch is currently focused on projects in Barcelona. During the pandemic, a period of uncertainty for artists, Buch was exhibiting in three different spaces: "It was a tough stage because the exhibitions stopped being in-person, and the atmosphere had to be moved to the virtual mode". Thus, Buch also speaks of the complexity behind the act of exhibiting: "You have to create an entire coherent environment to make the work function and make sense", something that we also take very seriously in our project #NNWallery, which must make sense to those who see it regularly, neighbors, passersby, or tourists among others.
With a chameleonic style and strokes of catastrophism and irony, Buch is characterized by his adaptation to what the environment offers, and manages to capture the same dystopian ideology across different mediums. His work for the NN Wallery project maintains this essence, with two cats falling and blending into some garlands. Buch explains: "Through this piece of urban art, I envision a nocturnal Barcelona, yet at the same time lively and festive. The night through the figures of the cats, which fall and twist, and life through the festivity of the garlands."
For Buch, proportions are secondary if the goal is to bring dynamism to the work: "In the case of the cats, the twist of the two animals is forced, to exaggerate precisely this sense of movement in the mural."His style powerfully transcends the boundaries of reality, something he has sought to express through the dimensions and rotation of the cats. In his works, Buch turns to dystopian references and contradiction, and adds: "My style can be understood as somewhat melancholic, but there is always light, an irony."
El primer mural en formar parte del proyecto NN Wallery fue obra de Pez Barcelona, en el muro de la antigua fábrica de Metalarte en Sant Joan Despí. La acogida de los vecinos fue muy positiva, y el agradecimiento que mostraron hacia el artista ha estado presente también en las intervenciones de NN Wallery que la han seguido, donde se ha dado esa misma interacción entre artista y persona. Buch nos habla de la visita de vecinos que, curiosos, observaban como el artista desarrollaba su creación: “Muchas personas se acercaron para comentar sus distintas interpretaciones, y eso, al final, es parte de la esencia del arte urbano. Me gusta que cuando alguien observa un cuadro o una obra, la dote de significado”, puntualiza.
Interacting with people during the creation of a work is one of the characteristics of #urbanart. Buch explains that he has great respect for #graffiti artists who are dedicated to urban creation. "It's not easy having to paint surrounded by people and noise, and it requires a lot of physical effort", he says.
The creativity of any artist is usually linked to their inspiration, and this has always been the case for Buch throughout his career. "For me, the process of creation is constant. When you exhibit in a gallery, inspiration comes for other projects, and they all end up being more or less connected. I operate based on research objectives on various themes, which interest me especially when I have not yet managed to decipher them", Buch maintains.
Currently, Buch is immersed in other projects and has participated in cultural residencies to work on sculpture, an artistic discipline he has lately focused on. In fact, one of his sculptures was exhibited last April at the I·lacions gallery, as part of the “Inferences” exhibition; it was a tribute to the myth of Narcissus, and included a mirror that accompanied the stone creature.“Right now, I am very focused on sculpting, especially in stone, and I am also playing with the found object, which is based on the idea of finding objects and recreating them through sculpture”concludes the artist.
Our project NN Wallery, curated by Norma Editorial and Il·lacions, was launched in 2018, and has been growing ever since. Therefore, we bid farewell to 2022 with Buch's intervention and his “entangled kittens”, which you can visit on the shutter of the parking garage on Marquès de Sentmenat Street, 54.
