A multimedia artist best known for painting, assemblage, and occasional performance outbursts; Saavedra lives and works just south of downtown San Antonio (TX), across from FL!GHT, the enterprising art space where he serves as “senior creative co-conspirator.”
As seen in the McNay Art Museum, Blue Star Contemporary Art Center, Museo de Arte Moderno, Cinematexas, Artpace, UTSA’s Institute of Texan Cultures, Art Lies: A Contemporary Art Quarterly (#63), and www.edsaavedra.com.
Press
“Saavedra’s work never relies on knee-jerk shock value or easy irony, but is instead animated by a spirit of gritty, thwarted romanticism.” -Curblog
”While he’s evolved significantly as a stylist since [2002], that painting [“still life with bacon”] established some of the signal characteristics of his subsequent work: An impassioned social theme, usually an exuberant attack on law enforcement or other state authority; an eye-seducing knack for elegant line, immersive palette and complex surface; a talent for likeness, whether of the human form in general or for portraiture; and an unassuming workmanlike vibe in contrast to his audacious willingness to take on scale. The first time I was surrounded by Saavedras, it was at his one-man show at FL!GHT, All By Myself 2008-09. I was bowled over by the densely worked surfaces, the masterful but elusive technique of paint application… A self-portrait he shows me at his house contains a background landscape obscured and suggestive, the unmistakably lined yet liquid blotch of the Tower of the Americas reminding me of Turner.” –Sarah Fisch
”He paints tweaked yet commanding portraits with mesmerizing skill (if you’ve seen his Harvey Milk or Ramsey Lewis, you’ll never forget them), but steps out of hoary boxes of genre and medium with sly grace. To wit: His performance installation at last year’s Luminaria, one of that evening’s few truly bright spots, wherein he “acted” as an office copy clerk — eyeglasses, tie, smoke breaks and all — in a mocked-up corporate copy shop he used to run off hundreds of free prints for engaged onloookers. Ed Saavedra’s ability to render physical beauty and his rejection of preciousness combine astonishingly in Requiem for an English Major… You’ve got to see it to get it.” –Plaza de Armas