Barrio Escalante, San José

Visits by appointment only

Schedule a visit (opens the scheduler)
Adán y Eva en el Paraíso (tríptico), by Orlando Sobalvarro. A sandy, stippled haze pervades everything.

Orlando Sobalvarro

Adán y Eva en el Paraíso (tríptico)

Year
1998
Technique
Oil/Canvas
Dimensions
134 × 229 cm
Status
Available
Palette
ochre, mauve, sand, olive green, dark brown
Brushwork
Atmospheric scumbling and stippling of superimposed glazes with sharp linear edges.

Curatorial analysis

A sandy, stippled haze pervades everything. Before the eye can decipher the figures, the surface asserts itself as a dense atmosphere of rubbed pigments and subtle glazes, where toasted ochres, dusty mauves, and faint moss greens coexist. Against this vaporous, almost geological backdrop, the three presences of the myth emerge with the precision of sheets carved from bone or polished metal: two stylized humanoid silhouettes flanking the composition and, suspended in the central panel, the sinuous undulation of the serpent.

The tripartite format does not isolate the figures, but rather articulates a continuous ceremonial frieze. Clean, luminous contour lines delineate the faceted planes of Adam and Eve, whose crescent-shaped heads and tapered limbs evoke archaic totems or figures from a sacred theater. On their torsos, small dark circles pierce the surface like buttons or anatomical anchor points. A magnetic tension sweeps across from left to right. Both figures extend their arms toward the center with tense hands, fingers splayed like fans, as if testing the air or pointing toward the creature levitating above a dark triangular plinth. The serpent, segmented and floating, breaks the vertical rigidity of the stretchers through a horizontal arabesque that guides the eye toward a small upper sphere, a distant suggestion of the forbidden fruit or a pale celestial body.

Light does not emanate from a discernible external source; it springs from the weave of the canvas itself and from the illuminated edges separating the faceted volumes from surrounding shadows. The Genesis narrative is stripped of any moralizing anecdote to become an esoteric rite, where pictorial matter feels fossilized by ancient eras. By transforming paradise into a chamber of mineral resonances and weightless bodies, the triptych suspends the fatality of the fall in an unresolved pause, transmuting the biblical myth into a mysterious moment of pure choreographic contemplation.

Adán y Eva en el Paraíso (tríptico)

More works by Orlando Sobalvarro

1 work

Sold and historical

Similar works

By subject, palette and style

Message the gallery on WhatsApp

Cookies

We use cookies to learn how the site is used and to show the gallery's ads on other platforms. They are only turned on if you accept them.