Armando Romero

Armando Romero’s paintings often juxtapose his re-painting of historical works by Old Masters like Velazquez, Bosch, and Veronese with images from popular culture; consequently, the adjective most commonly used to describe his work is ‘irreverent.’ This practice is typified in series like Las Nuevas Tentaciones De San Antonio (2000) in which he re-paints and re-presents Bosch’s triptych The Temptations of St. Anthony (1501) but in addition to the fantastic imagery typical of Bosch already in the original, Romero adds Tweety, Pokémon, various Looney Tunes and Disney characters – Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Bugs Bunny, Woody Woodpecker, and Goofy – superheroes including Superman, Spiderman, and the Fantastic Four, the Jetsons, Topcat, Penelope Pitstop, the Flintstones, Smurfs, the gang from Scooby-Doo and Jerry from Tom and Jerry. At first glance, irreverent certainly seems like an appropriate description of such work but further consideration of his historical source here – particularly because Romero frequently returns to Bosch – suggests that we consider not only quite how irreverent it is to describe the work of an artist as irreverent in the 21st century.

Text in English and Spanish.