Interview withEduardo Navarro Q
“My passion has always been art. I am a self-taught artist, learning by failing, picking up the pieces and trying again.”
Eduardo Navarro Q was born 1960 in Panama City, Panama. His work can be best described as neo - expressionistic, abstract action/drip painting, with a great sense of movement, color and texture. The horse has been a central subject for years and appears in his work throughout the last decades, capturing its free spirit on canvas and in 3D sculptures.
Eduardo’s life story is interesting, eventful and nothing less then spectacular.
In the late eighties he fought against General Noriega’s dictatorial regime in the streets of Panama, surviving the American invasion and protecting his family and neighbourhood.
He was an ultralight pilot, holding three national aviation records, flying all over Panama, landing on lakes, rivers and oceans. A keen windsurfer and parachutist he also walked for 12 days through the Darien Virgin jungle, to commemorate the crossing of the Spaniards led by Panama city founder Pedrarias DaVila back in 1519.
You might get the idea that Eduardo Navarro is an action seeking adventurist, a boundless force of energy that forces its way out creating art. But..he also has a calmer, much more gentle side.
Every year Eduardo and his team organize motivational art camps for 500 children at El Valle De Anton, a quiet little village in the highlands of Panama. These art camps are a great way to promote art and culture among the young population. A rewarding and joyful experience not only beneficial for the students attending, but also for himself. He states “Children have such pure energy. It motivates me!”
Navarro has been exhibiting in solo and in group art exhibitions in Europe, South Africa, America, Columbia, Chile, Peru, Mexico, Argentina, China and Japan since 1982. His work can be seen in a large number of public as well as private collections, counting the Japanese royal family amongst his collectors.
At what age did you become interested in art?
ENQ: I think I became interested in art around the age of two. Ever since I was a young boy, my grandfather, Camilo Quelquejeu (this is where the Q comes from in Eduardo’s last name red.) encouraged me to draw. I guess looking back, this is where my real passion for drawing and art began.
What makes the horse an inspirational subject for you?
ENQ: I was raised on a farm with lots of animals and especially horses and have been riding horses for as long as I can remember. They still inspire me. The horse is part of me, part of my being, part of my art. For the past 45 years I have been working on my painting and sculpting. The last 17 years I have dedicated my art to the spiritual freedom of wild horses.
“I feel I am in the middle of a performance, creating an installation, every time I paint …the only rule is that there are no rules … that’s one good thing I have from not having a formal education in academic art, I have no boundaries!”
How did you develop in your work over the years?
ENQ: I studied mechanical engineering and have a masters degree in Business Administration. I later found out that my interests lay completely elsewhere.
Over 30 years ago I worked at Citibank in New York. In my time living in the city I must have visited every single art museum at least five times! These visits were a crucial part of my art formation.
Seeing the works by all these famous legends and saying to myself “wow, I can feel their happiness in expressing exactly what they wish , and not what the system might have tried to impose on them”. The joy of that freedom the artists seemed to have, visible in every sense of the word. The tecniques they used, the bold colours and brushstrokes, the materials and media, and size of the canvasses. For me this was the first time I truly got to admire huge formats and the possibilities they represented, but mainly in the concepts they dared to choose. To me it was truly mindblowing.
Do you have a favorite memory which involves horses?
ENQ: I do have a favorite memory! I have had a few narrow escapes whilst riding horses, falling of the back of a horse in full gallop. The thing I most admire about the horse is their lack of tameness at the precise point in time of those accident. In other words, they were just carrying out what nature and evolution dictated … I was almost a part of their evolution.
Who are your sources of inspiration, people you admire or look up to?ENQ: Anything that motivates me also inspires me. I take inspiration from tons of places and from my everyday life. I couldn’t pinpoint any artist or other source of inspiration precisely …I think I admire too many people!
When I started my career, besides studying my classic friends like Leonardo, van Gogh, Michaelangelo, Caravaggio and Goya, I also took influences from more contemporary artists like Kandinsky, Klimt, Kahlo, Paul Klee, Miro, Lucian Freud, Munch, Basquiat, etc.
My two heroes were Pablo Picasso and Marc Chagall, I loved the way both of them thought and worked , in that order… The way they challenged the establishment… in time I also began to admire other artists like Egon Schiele, sculptor Giacometti, Degas, Dali, Rodin, Kokoschka, Diebenkorn, Rivera among others. Each has their own unique style and when I discovered Jackson Pollock… my whole way of painting changed.
Contact
Eduardo’s work can be seen in musea all over the world. If you want to see where or want to find out more on Eduardo, then please visit his website and Instagram page.
Joyce Ter Horst
All photos used with kind permission of Eduardo Navarro Q.
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Copyright © 2019 by Joyce Ter Horst/Paard Verzameld. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the writer.
