Juan Carlos Noria, Barcelona, Spain
A confluence of cultures and contradictions Juan Carlos Noria is a fresh proponent of the visual art scene in Ottawa, Canada. Born in Caracas, Venezuela he carries his Latin American sensibility on his sleeve. As a teen growing up in Canada, he became an accomplished figure skater. Grace and lines were an obsession. So, too were his ideas of subversion. He fell out of skating after hitting the rigid class structure of the sport, finding comfort (and discomfort) in visual art, on the streets with a paint can, postering, skateboarding, fleeing police. A strange opportunity then came. A world tour with Disney on ice. It heightened his sense of absurdity, humor and anger, sharpened his visual and social awareness.
True to his subversive nature, he undercuts his own personality allowing himself to explore two other personas and visual styles. He has been influenced by his contemporaries Mark Marsters, Pat Thompson and Dave Cooper. Yet, he is himself-singular Juan. He is without pretense, full of concern for others, quick to laugh and quicker to paint something ripe.
