Review: Politics, ennui on display in Cuban-born artist’s solo show

Bottom line: A fascinating mix of commentary and compelling style in works that straddle political commentary and metaphysical angst.

Alejandro Aguilera creates the kind of political cartoons not likely to wind up on the opinion page of the daily paper.

A captivating brew of existentialism, ennui and, occasionally, political commentary, the 83 drawings featured in the Swan Coach House Gallery exhibition "Seriously Funny: Political Cartoons and Illustrations" often resemble the absurdist, acerbic meditations on life and modern mores in publications from The New Yorker to Mad magazine.

Tackling subjects from gay marriage and immigration to radical Islam and global warming, this Atlanta-based artist has created an unusual exhibition at Swan Coach House, in which an artist more known for his earthy palette and soulful portraits shows a different side of his output. In often terse, punchline-driven illustrations, Aguilera conveys some of the understandably resigned wit of a Cuban-born immigrant whose storytelling is deeply rooted in a culture of subversive humor aimed at corrupt or controlling institutions.

Topics can be pointed and precise, in images that appear to lampoon Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump as a looming figure with enormous shoulders filling the frame, or in another illustration, “Beauty of the Global Warming II,” in which a man wearing a spacesuit vacuums water from the ocean. Sometimes the commentary is on point, and other times it can gild the lily with an exaggerated, didactic style and message.

But Aguilera’s illustrations can also be far more philosophical, untethered to the political climate, and more about a human tendency toward idol worship, angst, alienation and more. In the ink on paper illustration “Adoration,” a crowd of headless figures stand before an enormous pedestal holding an enormous sculpted head. In “Narcissus (Selfie)” in ink and crayon, a drowning figure lifts a cellphone above the waves for a doomed selfie. And in “Burning Fat,” an overweight man exercises with a piano-sized hamburger strapped to his back.

Other images hover somewhere in between explicit political message and philosophical koan. Such works operate in a middle ground between straight-from-the-headlines commentary and broader statements about the human condition.

The beautifully concise “The Raft” is one such image, a haunting ink drawing featuring a small door through which hundreds of people wait to pass. Beyond, a tiny raft floats, beckoning in the ocean, a pathetic offer of salvation for the deluge. It’s hard not to see a reference to the Syrian crisis and the overburdened boats and rafts that have offered dangerous passage to refugees. But the image has larger associations, too, to overpopulation and dwindling resources and a vast human need far outweighing opportunities. In works like that one, Aguilera reaches poetic heights beyond the one-two punchline of his more overtly political works.

But the real standouts in “Seriously Funny” manage to coalesce style and substance, and show the artist’s unique skill set. While his more minimalist, political cartoon-style works can be powerful, Aguilera’s abilities shine especially bright when he creates busy, swirling vortexes of visual action it’s easy to get lost in.

Enthralling and complex, these illustrations effectively convey the miasma of life and the cataclysm of history as in “Non-Violence God (M.L.K.)” in ink, crayon and acrylic, a drawing featuring a pulsating, consuming mass of dynamic movement. By the same token, “Ladies in White” is a Gauguin or Rousseau-evocative image of dozens of dark-skinned women of every age and type dressed in white and carrying flowers whose figures consume the page, a kind of blissed-out wallpaper and affirmation of loveliness in an often absurd world.