Agustina Fuster
- Anna Lilli Garai
- Apr 26
- 3 min read
Updated: 4 days ago
Agustina Fuster’s paintings work quietly. Light, reflection, and shadow slip across layered surfaces, setting up a space where things feel both close and just out of reach. Working in Buenos Aires, she uses glass, mirrors, and transparency not to clarify, but to complicate—fracturing the image, softening its edges. Her approach moves between visibility and absence, placing trust in subtlety rather than statement.
Q: What makes you want to paint something that looks like it’s not quite there?
A: I think that it’s some kind of search for other perceptions. Certain variables need to align for light to reflect in one way or another, or for a color or shadow to appear that wasn’t there before. I try to find those points of intersection in this dimension we’re able to perceive. In my case, that search takes shape through the language of painting, which is my tool.
Q: You work a lot with glass, mirrors, folds. What’s the appeal in things that bend or break the image?
A: I’ve found, in these fragile, transparent and malleable materials, a parallel to the abstract notions of illusion. Much like in metaphysical painting, everyday elements become carriers of deeper, existential meanings. My work searches for that tension between what is seen and what is sensed — where a reflection might distort, a shadow might reveal, and the familiar turns uncertain.
Q: In pieces like "The Distorted Shape" or "The Metaphor", space feels kind of unstable. What are you trying to hold onto—or let slip?
A: I’m drawn to the possibility of suspending time in an image that feels on the verge of becoming something else. My scenes unfold in a space governed by its own internal logic — there are clues scattered throughout, like a light appearing at the edge of the scene.
Something else is happening simultaneously, just beyond what’s fully visible. I’m interested in letting go of our usual understanding of time, and entering a more subtle dimension of observation — one where presence and absence overlap, and where illusion reveals something more than what is directly shown.
Q: How much do you plan a painting, and how much do you let it unfold as you go?
A: My paintings are carefully planned. I actually construct these scenarios, photograph them, select and compose the image using several frames, and then move to the canvas to paint it. Throughout this process, the language of painting transforms the image. There are times when a painting quietly asks for something that wasn’t there at first. I might add it, but only if it feels right — as if the work itself is guiding the process.
Q: Your work hides as much as it shows. What kind of response do you want that to trigger?
A: I try to create space for a pause. Personally, I’ve been dedicating more and more time to contemplation — to simply being there. It’s in that suspended time, in quiet observation, where possibilities for the invisible begin to open up.
A painting could suggest a question, and another painting may hold part of the answer, and we are spectators of what unfolds in that dimension.
It’s an invitation to observe and to imagine new perspectives.
Q: Do you ever think about how long a viewer looks at your work — and what they miss if they don’t stay?
A: I believe there are layers of meaning that gradually unfold, and it depends on how much attention you give to something — it will give you more or less in return. I think that’s a parallel with life in general.
In paintings, which are static, you put all the elements in the scene, and it depends on the viewer. But with video, you can play with that temporality. I recently showed a video as part of an installation, where a mirror remained still on screen for several minutes, and all you could hear was the sound of it breaking. I enjoyed watching people’s reactions — seeing how long they stayed. Those who stayed until the end witnessed the moment when the sound of breaking finally matched the action. One person left and later came back, saying, ‘Oh, I missed it!’ I loved that moment, because it was exactly what I wanted to happen.
