Patricia Araujo

ARTIST BIO

Patricia Araujo was born in Miami, Florida, the daughter of Colombian parents. She grew up in Bogota, Colombia and lived there until the age of 19. She began drawing at a very early age, always intrigued by architecture and form. Her father worked as an architect at Walt Disney, and during his last years he assisted with the development of Epcot Center. After completing high school in Bogota, Araujo moved to Northern California and studied architecture, painting, and photography. In 2005 she obtained her second B.F.A in Painting, from the San Francisco Art Institute.

Araujo has a particular sensitivity to the forms and spaces of architecture and produces works relating to those forms which function as physical embodiments of philosophical and psychological conditions. Her interest in researching the urban landscape continues to grow, addressing the evolution and decay within a city. Araujo continues to deepen her conceptual themes on architecture, place and change in the urban landscape. 

She has been exhibiting in San Francisco since 1998. In 2008 she published her first book, entitled SOMA SEEN. Her work has been written about in the San Francisco Chronicle, ARTslant, Beyondchron, and the San Francisco Bay Guardian. She lives and works in the San Francisco Bay Area.

ARTIST STATEMENT

For over a decade I've painted San Francisco's central city architecture. While I lived in the area, I was enchanted by its rich architectural history and the decayed beauty of many buildings that remain, and I continue to paint both iconic city landmarks and abandoned downtown buildings, as an elegy to San Francisco's architectural past. Since 2008, I embarked a new series of paintings titled, Tomorrowland Today. The newer series was inspired by futuristic, classical, and industrial architecture; the specific point of departure was finding photographs of circus arenas in Romania and Ukraine. The structures I've brought together in these paintings also include coliseums, citadels, and roller coasters. These imaginary cityscapes are a mixture of old and new constructions from various places, East and West.
To learn more about Tomorrowland, read here 

ART REVIEWS/ PRESS
"Idealization of Shapes" Review@ Artbusiness.com, by Alan Bamberger, dated July 29th, 2011.
"Heart of the City/SOMA SEEN", ARTslant, dated January 28th, 2009, Review by Wilma Parker.
"Resuscitating the Heart of San Francisco", SF Chronicle, by Heather Knight, dated December 24, 2008
"Heart of the City": Structures Built to Last", SF Chronicle, by Reyhan Harmanci, dated November 27th, 2008.
"Heart of the City", ArtBusiness.com, by Alan Bamberger, November 21st, 2008.
"Tenderloin CBD Gets New Office; Art Exhibit Tonight!", Beyondchron.org, by Paul Hogarth, November 21st, 2008.
"HEART OF THE CITY", SF BAY GUARDIAN BEST WEEKLY PICK, November 21st, 2008, by Michelle Broder Van Dyke
"DA Arts Paintings Selected for Bloomingdales' Opening", Beyondchron.org, by Randy Shaw, dated September 27th, 2006.
"Architecture for Bloomingdales - Patricia Araujo at DA Arts", Beyondchron.org, Review by Wilma Parker, dated September 7/06.

To view Patricia Araujo's complete resume and portfolio online, please visit:  www.AbstractMetropolis.com

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NEW BOOK PUBLICATION, TOMORROWLAND TODAY

"This series of paintings by Patricia Araujo is not a realistic depiction of any one Tomorrowland at any single point in time. It is, collectively, an artist’s fantasy, like a theme and variations in music, about the imaginative act involved in designing a representation of the future, seeing it built, seeing it get older. It unobtrusively reminds us that looking forward and looking back are closely connected.”   From the foreword by Jerome Tarshis.

Book is available for purchase online Blurb Publishing and at William Stout Architectural Books in San Francisco.

To view Book's complete Preview, please visit here

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“Araujo reminds us that the buildings of our cities' commercial neighborhoods were architects' fantasies before they became assertive new realities and then, after the passage of time, objects of nostalgia. All three stages of that evolution live side by side in this book. These paintings and drawings depict praiseworthy examples of San Francisco architecture, some utilitarian and others grandly ornamental. The book as a whole reaffirms the city's daydream of itself as a uniquely beautiful amalgam of past and present.” Jerome Tarshis, Art Critic

SOMA SEEN is available for purchase online at Blurb Publishing and at the following bookstores in San Francisco:
Green Arcade Bookstore and at William Stout Architectural Books.