(Cuba, b. 1958)

Gustavo Acosta’s cityscapes are imbued with a desolate grandeur, and share a disquieting similarity: they are uninhabited. The absence of people and of human-scale encourages an abstract reading of Acosta’s paintings, as theatrical sets or models. At a glance, Acosta’s paintings appear to be realistic, three-dimensional renderings. Closer inspection reveals a painterly emphasis on a two-dimensional surface. This “push-pull” of three-dimensional and two-dimensional space lends a flickering, instability to Acosta’s imagery. Whether viewed through the lens of history, social criticism, or psychology, Gustavo Acosta’s paintings remain disquieting meditations on the disjunctions of appearance and reality.