Vincent Valdez handles light in unique and compelling ways throughout his work. He also frequently represents the source of a work’s internal illumination, such as a truck’s headlights raking across the figures in The City. Here to talk about Valdez’'s handling of light is Peter Molick, a photographer of Valdez’s work.

I first met Vincent about 10 years ago when his gallerist at the time, David Shelton, asked me to go to San Antonio, to his studio to photograph a work in progress. When I arrived at his studio, it was this historic fire station that had been renovated into a home and a studio for him and his partner, Adriana.

Some of his paintings seem to have shared sense of of place despite the place being sort of ambiguous, um we see a similar lighting quality in So Long MaryAnn that we do in Rise and if you look even closer in that painting, in the eye of the subject the sun from Rise is reflected in his eye

Through regularly documenting his work, Molick and Valdez became friends. Here Molick shares his observations about Valdez’s approach outside the studio

I think one of the things that I’ve really learned or come to appreciate um through my friendship with Vincent is um appreciating how he sees world. You- you can’t walk down the street with Vincent and not have him reference how the light is hitting a building or how there might be some interesting composition just in nature that he’s like taking note of constantly and sort of logging in in his toolkit for later.

Conocí a Vincent hace unos 10 años cuando su galerista de entonces, David Shelton, me pidió que fuera a San Antonio, a su estudio, para fotografiar una obra en proceso. Cuando llegué a su estudio, se trataba de una histórica estación de bomberos que había sido renovada para convertirla en una casa y un estudio para él y su pareja, Adriana. Algunas de sus pinturas parecen tener un sentido compartido del lugar a pesar de que el lugar es algo ambiguo. Vemos una calidad de iluminación similar en So Long MaryAnn que en Rise y, si miras más de cerca en esa pintura, en el ojo del sujeto se refleja el sol de la obra “Rise”. 

Al documentar regularmente las obras de Valdez, los dos se hicieron amigos. Aquí Mollick comparte sus observaciones sobre el enfoque de Valdez fuera del estudio. 

Creo que una de las cosas que realmente he aprendido o que he llegado a apreciar a través de mi amistad con Vincent es cómo ve él el mundo. No puedes caminar por la calle con Vincent y no escucharlo hablar de cómo la luz se refleja en un edificio o de cómo puede haber alguna composición interesante en la naturaleza de la que toma nota constantemente y la registra en su caja de herramientas para más adelante.