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Jorge Bernardo Lopera Doncel 

Seeds of Hope

2023

Artist statement

In this ceramic sculpture, the artist explores seeds as a metaphor for hope. Around the year 2000, the Colombian government launched a project to replace cultivated coca plants with cacao trees, to help the cultivators move away from the implications of cocaine production.  In his sculpture, Lopera uses slabs to make the whole body of the cacao bean, the cover, and the seeds. He thinks fruits are the perfect form to represent a vessel keeping something precious inside. The external textured white shape depicts solemnity and evokes wood. He makes the beans black and white for contrast and to show that not all the seeds will grow as trees. Finally, the rutile oxide and gold luster finishing connect with the idea of preciousness and treasure.

Detailed photograph of the work Seeds of Hope featuring a small grouping of black and white glazed earthenware with gold luster cacao seeds along side a rendering of the cacao bean. Only the back of the bean is captured, it is a textured white and matte earthenware.
Picture of the full artwork. The documentation shows a small grouping of  small groupings of black and white glazed earthenware with gold luster displayed outside and inside the cacao bean. We can see the interior of the bean which is black with gold luster streaks and its white matte exterior. Along side the ceramic vessel there is a white matte ceramic leaf shaped piece with holes echoing the shape of the beans.

Artist’s biography

Jorge Lopera recently completed a major in Fine Arts at Concordia University in Montréal. He also studied literature, jewelry, and silversmithing in Bogota. He makes sense of the world through written language, painting, and sculpture, using clay, metal, wood, stone, found objects, egg tempera, and oil painting. Lopera wrote a book of stories about everyday life (Doce, 2017) and developed jewelry collections based on abstractions of animals and plants. For him, the creative act is a cycle between receiving and giving. He has exhibited works in Fresh Paint (a Concordia University, 2023); XXII Primavera (House of Culture, Cajica, 2014); Five Notions of Art (Pueblo Viejo Country Club, Art and Space Gallery, Bogota, 2013); C.C. Identify Yourself with Your Work (Casa Ensamble, Bogota, 2011); and presented in the magazine Ezine, Creativos Colombianos ( Bogota, 2007).

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