ROJAS, AFTER GIVING YOU A HUGNothing is better than a zinc surface for the incision of an engraving needle.It requires determination, rage and love to leave sentimental traces on a metal surface.Agustin Rojas and I share the same belief: that any kind of intervention on a sheet is valid in order to obtain all potential expressions from the matrix, including the concept of a “dirty sheet”. Many years have passed since that last time I saw the work of this artist, and I fi nd the métier’s philosophy in his new pieces, where he is overcoming certain technical mannerisms and pushing to the background the danger of perfection by neatness, always a risk for the graphic artwork.Choosing drypoint as a printmaking technique has resulted in a notable turning point for Rojas’ imaginary, since the chosen medium makes possible different formal solutions and forces him to take a new point of view. The incision on the metal sheet is not crucial in drypoint, because what brings the artwork to life is the proper cleaning of the sheet with tarlatane (and even fi ngers), retouching the grooves opened with the engraving needle, removing the excess ink, and leaving the required amount to get a tone that expresses and builds precision and feelings.Previous works by this etcher earned him the reputation as a master of mezzotint –perhaps the most complex engraving techniques-, as someone who takes pleasure in the creation of the fi nest tonal qualities that light up images of solitary environments in abandonment. However, in this exhibition, life experience has led the artist to a more energetic medium to express the reality. The decision to print in black and white, with very limited and subdued use of color, allows an optimal response of the metal surface as a vehicle to signify at highly dramatic levels.This set of exhibited prints does not represent a serial discourse, but a sentimental bond between the images can be found. Hugs, encounters and farewells, frame the route that begins with an uncertain journey driven by despair and blessed by an ideal, in that image of naturalistic drawing about the peculiar Cuban exodus. Thus, an old dying man is dozing under a beam of light that announces his early departure to another dimension, in a piece of technical excellence that creates a gloomy atmosphere. And, fi nally, there is a reference in three dissimilar pieces, a desolate, Cuban landscape, through expressive approaches ranging from enigmatic to delirious.The drama covered in this exhibition describes a romantic streak in the artist’s attitude of emphasizing a sentimental expression, sometimes channeled by a defi ned expressionist language. This variety of formal approaches deserves a more consistent selection in the future, but on the other hand makes evident that Rojas possesses professional resources of the highest level.This artist’s works does not seem to belong to the present century, where the signifi ers reject a visual aesthetic to make demagogic, banal, cryptic meanings, an artistic farce due to lack of competence in the representation of ideas. But this should be a future issue for curators, well defi ned by someone as art “coaches”.I remember three hugs in my whole life: when I woke up from fainting in the arms of my wife, when I met with a lady after a pending kiss and, fi nally, the embrace of my cousin at the airport in Miami after forty years of not seeing each other. I am convinced that all those hugs were stolen by Agustin Rojas.

Eugenio D’MelonSenior LecturerEdna Manley Collage of the Visual and Performing Arts.May 2014

There is a man who takes steps in the more rigorous order of his time and passes through burins, acids, metals and the nostalgia contained in his memory. I know about this nostalgia which invades him.Agustin Rolando Rojas wakes up every morning far away from the greens and blues that saw him grow, and sometimes, many times, the absence of these shades hurt. Distance and memories hurt.Is fortunate for Rojas, though, fortunate that he masters the excellence and tidiness of chalcography. Made of two and three plates, the visual language of the work gives away its characters’ commitment to love. And in those embraces, in all those circles that blend two bodies into one, carries loneliness, reunions, the fractured distance and fear. We do not know if the characters are arriving or leaving; we do not know if they are laughing or crying by mistrust of fate. And it doesn’t matter. In each embrace, Agustin expresses fragility and strength, love and devotion. Moments that seem eternal.Looking at each piece it is unforgivable not to notice the meticulous work, the dedication, the sense of perfection and patience. Each stroke and the shades of inks as consequence – the resulting pristine blacks and whites – confer a dramatism to the prints that I doubt Rojas himself, in the exercise of creation, doesn’t feel embraced. There cannot be a different image. Arms and hands and bodies represented with a punctual and elegant synthesis.The embrace as a gesture in Rojas’s work is omnipresence. And in an effort to express from within everything he feels and love: the Royal Palm tree, the raft as a symbol of exodus, odyssey or adventure, and the white rose, he displays a set of symbols that perform as a reverence, no matter how far he is from his island.I learnt a while ago that the idea of experiencing exile was so remote and natural that we did not take it into account, and it is precisely in the moment of being born, in this act of tearing and expulsion of the mother, by loving, that we come to existence. And it ca be a success that we were not aware of because it is from that very fi rst moment we start growing and being.That’s why this exhibition is a detailed expression of sweetness and tenacity. A portrait of the sensibility of this man who resembles his time when bringing in his hands “ a white rose for the real friend”

Almeris Herrera MartinesArt Historian.Madrid, SpainMay, 2014

To embrace.To surround a thing or someone with arms.To embrace submitting strongly to it.To enclose the ephemeral between certain limits. Permanence.To understand even one thing within itself. What with one and accompanies one everywhere.To corner the gap. Surround. Wrap. Narrow, tightly.To adhere to a part of a whole. The sensuality of the smell of fresh ink, the paper. To its condition of resistance. To its full absorbency.To stick to the matter, to the fi rm incision of the burin, the footprint that blends present and remembrance and builds on a zinc plate.To dream about reproducible surface. Hold on. Deliver it.To cover, in this reciprocal action, the universe of the own imaginary.To caress, to feel.Images linked in a space of paper, energy, determination ink and metal.On a journey from loneliness to the embrace.Bridging distances.Trapping time.Of what we were and still, with courage and determination, we are.

Maria Elena Soto.Santa Cruz de Tenerife.May 2014

“Soliloquy of the lighthouse keeper” (fragment)

You, solitary truth,Transparent passion, my everlasting loneliness.You are an immense embrace;The darkness, the steppe,Man and his desire,The agitated crowd,What are they but yourself?For you, my loneliness, I look for them one day;For you, my loneliness, I love them now.

Luis Cernuda.

Agustin Rolando Rojas

-Born: Havana, Cuba, 1959-Place of Residence: Toronto-Media: Print, Drawing and Paintingagustinrojas@hotmail.com www.agustinrolandorojas.com www.unpackstudio.ca Home: 200 Wellesley Street East, M4X-1G3, Toronto, Canada

EDUCATION-1974-1978.San Alejandro Fine Art School. Havana, Cuba., BFA-1978-1983.Higher Art Institute of Havana. (I.S.A.), MFA. 5 Years Printmaking Specialized.-1983-1996. Taught printmaking at Higher Art Institute. ( I.S.A)

SOLO EXHIBITIONS -2010-“Let me hug you”.50 etchings , drawing and painting .Qbava Gallery. New Jersey April 5th. -2008- “Embraces” Three artists. Jesus Rivera, Elena Wagner, Agustin R Rojas. Lorrie Saunders Art Gallery. Norfolk VA. -2007- Recent works. London Square Fine Art Gallery, Norfolk VA-2003-“Behind the Hopes” El MUSEO Fine Art Gallery Buffalo, New York, USA.-2002-“A Closer View”. Stuyvesant Gallery .Buffalo .NY, USA.-2001- “Like a Hurricane” 1313 Queen St West, Art Gallery. Toronto. Canada-1997- Etchings and Watercolors, Glyde Hall, Banff Center for the Arts, Alberta, Canada.-1995- Drawings and Prints. Brasilia Design Center, Brasilia, Brazil-1986-”Betwen Two”. San Miguel Fine Art Gallery, Havana. Cuba.-1983-”Only Etchings” Havana Design Center, Cuba.

PRIZE AND AWARDS

-2005- Honorable mention at “Encounter 2005”, von Liebig Art Center, Naples .FL.-2004- Second Prize at The Art League of Fort Myers Juried competition 2004.Art Gallery of F. Myers, FL.-2001- Award. The Boston Printmakers 2001 North American Print Exhibition. Boston, MA.-2000- Award. BIMPE I, First Biennial International Miniature Print Exhibition, New Leaf Edition, Vancouver, Canada.-1997- Artist in Residence at The Banff Center for the Arts. Alberta, Canada.-1995- Prize Pilar /Joan Miro & Sothebys Foundation for Techniques and Development of Creative Projects. Palma de Mallorca, Spain.- Honorable Mention. XIII International “Maximo Ramos PRINT Prize”, Ferrol, Spain.-1994- Award Honorable Mention, III International Print Biennial of Ourense, Spain.-1990- First Prize Currier for Exchange of Small Stamp, CISP’90. Experimental Printshop of Havana, Cuba.-1990- Awarded National Landscape Juried Show. Havana National Fine Art Museum.-1983- Awarded, Cuba National Juried Print Show Juried Competition. Tespis Hall. Havana Libre Hotel. Havana. Cuba.

ARTWORKS IN COLLECTION

-Drypoint Grafik Museum. Uzice. Serbia.-Lowe Art Museum Cuban American Permanent Collection., Miami USA.-National Fine Art Museum of Havana, Cuba.-Pilar Juncosa & Joan Miro and Sotheby’s Foundation, Spain.-Kanagawa Art Foundation, Japan.-Tama Art University. Tokyo, Japan.-Caixa Ferrol.Coruña, Caixanova , Spain.-Banff Centre for the Arts. Alberta, Canada.-Wolfgang Shreiner, Private Collecting of Ludwig Foundation, Germany.