Collision/Collusion: A Personal Underground
Description of work
Michael Sastre acquired a comfort with, maybe even a taste for, many things clandestine. His family pedigree was South Florida aviation. For years Michael witnessed (or at least tried to successfully navigate) the intrigue and subterfuge that came to define segments of that industry.
Drug smuggling, gun running, refugee smuggling, and rumored CIA sponsored operations ran parallel with legitimate passenger and cargo hauling from the areas’ airports.
The ironic juxtapositions of dramatic human events set on quasi-paradise environments are central to Sastre’s narrative paintings. For years Michael has explored this phenomenon of man’s intervention and passing thru the landscape while on a quest. Sometimes the figures in the painting may indicate either benevolent or nefarious action. Other times it is the detritus (usually a junked craft) that will hint at the narrative. Many of these paintings have been included in exhibitions titled “The Rafters” and “Smugglers” series.
Researching for a series of works can be an extensive task for the artist, “but”, says Michael, “it is also half the fun.” This research may involve a combination of: sketching places/people/ and old machinery, subject reading, oral interviews, archeology type travels, watching old film footage, and digging up photographs not previously published.
Whether it is a land or maritime narrative, Sastre sees his subjects functioning on the edges of frontier-like, inaccessible areas. On the fringes of forever, to dramatize the challenge, capturing the tension many of us feel whenever we venture deep into inaccessible areas. Inaccessible areas that are sometimes metaphorical for the mysteries of our own life journeys.