Dancing Lovers

Artist Alexandre Arrechea's "Dancing Lovers" is the artist's first etching since the 1980s and exemplifies his openness to experimentation with media, scale and color. In this print, Arrechea responds directly to his environment, drawing inspiration from the urban architecture he viewed while spending time at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Atlanta, Georgia. The imagery, however, references his sculpture series "The City that Stopped Dancing," with miniature representations of iconic buildings as humorously oversized toy tops. Like many of his works, "Dancing Lovers" usurps notions of functionality, and instead presents an emblematic construct of dominance and power—the monolithic skyscraper—as child's play. In doing so, Arrechea references the modern struggle for individual purpose and the paradoxes of identity construction therein.

From Melissa Messina, "Alexandre Arrechea: The Rules of Play," "Alexandre Arrechea: The Rules of Play" (exhibition catalog). Savannah College of Art and Design, 2011.