In concluding our Pastry Concepts and Design course each team of four individuals was paired with a local artist for our final project. From there, each team of two was tasked with developing a plated dessert inspired by the artist and their work. Four local painters, sixteen students, and eight teams led to the creation of eight unique and specifically engineered desserts. For this project, the Gold Team was assigned Oscar Aguilar Olea as their local artist, an expressionist figurative painter famous for his use of egg tempera paint. As depicted on his website, Oscar was a member of a group of twenty student artists from the Academia de San Carlos in Mexico City. In the mid-1970s these individuals took to the streets and began using “the fences of Mexico City as [their] canvas” under the name SUMA (Olea). With growing fame and popularity, this group of informal artists participated in the development of modern Mexican art before separating to concentrate on their individual careers. Oscar spent several years studying different techniques, in which time he developed his process for the use of egg tempera, as well as watercolors, oils, etchings, drawings, woodcutting, and sculpting. On the morning of February 23 Team Gold traversed to Napa to visit Oscar at his home and studio. Situated at the end of a rural …show more content…
Often the artist and the art are two separate entities; one can go to a museum and view an artist’s work, but rarely is the opportunity presented in which an artist can present their art and reveal their process. Never have I encountered an artist who has as much respect for their materials and procedure as Oscar does. His art is not only what he does, but also who he is. There is one remark that Oscar disclosed that continues to resonate with me: “Every morning I wake up to make the painting I’ve been dreaming to make my entire life… I still haven’t done it