Herrero’s paintings offer as many possible readings as they do layers of colour and form. The roofs and ceilings of San José, with rectangles of various shades of cadmium yellow (Zipacna, 2014), recall the colour palettes of Brazilian modernism. Meanwhile, the flat masses of paint in blue and green that descend into pastel colours of pink, sky-blue, violet and orange (Untitled, 2008) reveal an even broader visual spectrum. Each painting is the continuation of another; they propose a version of events, a map of subconscious dreams and fantasies illuminated by the artist’s interior world. Herrero’s abstractions are rather like mental forms distorted by personal memories from daily experiences of a local environment.
They are also immediately accessible to a spectator, who might view this surface tension (shapes, colours, forms) as friendly and playful compositions of a social intent. The pluralism of visual culture allows for a mutability of meanings, making Herrero’s fantastical dream world of complex mental territories one of universality.