Gustavo Andrade
Gustavo Andrade is a Venezuelan visual artist born in Maracaibo in 1993. He holds a degree in Visual Arts with a specialization in Drawing from the Facultad Experimental de Artes at the Universidad del Zulia (LUZ), where he graduated in 2018, and further developed his draftsmanship through studies at the Academia de Artes de Maracaibo (ACAM) under master draftsman Francisco Verde.
Andrade's work is rooted in figurative painting, where strong draftsmanship serves as the foundation for complex, symbol-laden compositions. His canvases are populated by archetypal figures — women, saints, jesters, fragmented bodies — suspended in charged, dreamlike environments that draw from the subconscious, political history, and the weight of cultural mythology. He works with dense layering, expressive color, and narrative tension, exploring themes of femininity, faith, power, and the chaos that lives beneath the surface of human experience. His paintings feel simultaneously ancient and urgent, as if excavated from a collective memory that has not yet been resolved.
Andrade's work has been recognized across Venezuela and internationally. He received an honorable mention at the Bienal Chiara Lubich and at the Salón Tranvía in 2016, and took first place at the Día del Artista Plástico exhibition at his alma mater alongside artist Sergio Garrido. He has participated in significant group exhibitions, including El Árbol de la Vida, Códigos, ¿Real?, Salón Simón Bolívar, and A la Luz del Trópico, and has been published in the Chilean art journal Sapo and featured in the Mexico City–based virtual platform Dapalu Gallery.
In 2022, Andrade was selected for the Trienal ABYA YALA: STRUCTURAL in New York — an international platform for research, exhibition, and interdisciplinary dialogue around the cultural, territorial, and structural dimensions of Abya Yala — marking his entry into the broader international contemporary art conversation. He also holds a virtual solo exhibition at the Centro de Arte de Maracaibo Lía Bermúdez (CAMLB).
