Jorge Chamorro (Madrid, 1972) is a graphic designer, teacher and artist. He obtained a Bachelor’s Degree in Audiovisual Communication from the Universidad Complutense de Madrid in 1995, he then worked for ten years as a graphic designer in several studios and agencies. In 2005 he started to work independently, developing communication projects for different clients and personal projects. Chamorro produced his first collage collection in 2006, and it has since become an irreplaceable art form he also teaches graphic design, typography, visual identity and collage. His work has been exhibited and published nationally and internationally.
Self-taught or art school?
Self-taught.
If you could own one work of art what would it be?
Stonehenge!
How would you describe your style?
Simple, straightforward. Although I prefer to talk about “language” rather than “style”. I don’t like the concept of “style” related to art, I think it can become a kind of prison. I’d be bored if I always worked with the same style.
If I think about the aesthetics of my work, I see there’s variety, sometimes the cut is very precise, sometimes it’s torn paper, sometimes straight lines… sometimes the motives are very realistic, sometimes abstract.., sometimes it’s a funny thing, sometimes creepy, sometimes sensual… But if I think about the language, then I see unity in my work, I see all of it, as I said, simple.
Can you tell us about your artistic process?
When I make a collage, I don’t pretend anything. I mean that I never work with a specific purpose, I never think “Today I’m making a collage series about love”, for example, or “I’m going to make something abstract or something political or something in black and white”. It’s the opposite of my design work, where I always have a goal. Maybe that’s why when I make collage I like to work differently. When I make collage I just open my books, my magazines, my cutouts, and wait until something “talks” to me. It might be a human body, a landscape, a shape, a colour, a shadow… Then I start to cut different things and then I try to find connections, things that match together until one of these connections just surprises me. Then maybe the collage is ready, or it’s just the starting point of a new direction. Usually, this process is quite slow, many times I sit in my table for hours, or days and nothing happens, nothing I do really surprises me. Sometimes I get results in five minutes, but the usual way is to start to see the light after a long battle that takes days. And then, another long battle until I glue. I try many options, I have many doubts, I take pictures very often, to compare different options. There’s no a Command Z when the work is analogue, and you don’t want to waste unique good photographies doing something you’re not totally happy with.
So, my collages are very simple, mostly only two pieces, but until I glue something, the process is long and hard, but I guess that’s what it has to be. To make collage (like designing) is a strange mixture of calm and nerves, peace and war, pleasure and suffering, it’s like being on the rope of the tightrope walker, somewhere between heaven and hell. But I like it.
Is narrative important within your work?
I’d say not too much. It depends on the collage, on the series, sometimes my collages are closer to something with a narrative behind, but it’s not something I look for. I try to generate a reaction in the viewer (as in myself), an impact, a surprise, more than to tell a story. I don’t pretend people to understand anything in my collages. Even I don’t pretend to understand them.
Who are your favourite artists and why?
So many… and so many art movements… But I think my favourite are the Avant-garde movements, especially Dadaism and Surrealism. I like the revolution these movements brought to art. As Punk did many years later. I’m interested in the “Do it your self” culture. I’m especially interested in the kind of art that seems easy, that makes you think “I could have done that”. But I also enjoy a lot a painting by Velázquez or Vermeer or a Gothic cathedral, which is something not very easy to make.
What or who inspires your art?
Difficult to say. I’m not sure… I guess the material I work with, the pictures of the books and magazines, the papers, the textures… And I guess all that surrounds me, it can be the work of other artists, my own work, but also life, people, landscapes, movies, politics, music… everything and nothing.
Where’s your studio and what’s it like?
My studio is my home, in Berlin. I always used to work at home, in Madrid, where I’m from. Then when I moved to Berlin, I worked for some years in a coworking space, and I enjoyed to be with other people and to ask them many times about different options of a collage, to have feedback every time I needed it, to let them play with the pieces… But I like to have my work close to me, to work until late at night, and to wake up and to look at the work before breakfast. Then, I think to work at home is my natural way of working.
Do you have any studio rituals?
Not specific rituals, apart from listening to music, but I listen to music all the time, anyway. I just need to have the need to make collage, which it’s not every day. I consider collage (or any art form) like something sacred, it has to be real and honest, so I don’t make collage as people go to the office. Sometimes I need to push me a bit to start, I love to make collage but I also love not to make it, I know that once I start I’ll be happy but I also will suffer. I need to be calm and have a lot of time, a whole day or a long night without anything else to do, especially when I’m starting something new. Once the process started and the collages over the table started to take shap, it’s the opposite, I need to push myself to stop, to do other things, to go to the street… because I just love it, and the process becomes addictive and obsessive, and because I work at home, every moment is good to move a piece, to try another background, even when you didn’t want…
What are you working on currently?
I’m working in a commissioned design project, a visual identity, and I’m working in two ongoing (and never-ending) series of collages. One is with portraits and the other one is with landscapes. And who knows what may appear in the middle of the road, as I said, I don’t have any specific goal when I make collage, so I never know how it’s going to end up. That’s the beautiful thing about this.
Where can we buy your art?
People interested can buy my collages directly from me, just sending me an email: jorge@jorgechamorro.es
I also have my artworks in an online gallery, Saatchi Art: https://www.saatchiart.com/jorgechamorro
