Príncipe Pío Station 2010

Editor: So, this is Consuelo Hernández's "Príncipe Pío Station" from 2010, painted in acrylic. There’s almost something Hopper-esque about the loneliness in this cityscape, but on a massive scale. What do you make of it? Curator: Well, immediately, the rigid lines and vastness bring to mind industrial cathedrals, spaces built for the movement of people, almost worshipful in their design but drained of any explicit religious symbolism. What stands out to me are the implied narratives – the posters, the passengers waiting. Do any of these elements speak to you specifically? Editor: I’m drawn to the lone figure looking at their phone. It seems like such a contemporary symbol. We are physically in this communal space, yet individually in another world. Curator: Precisely. The phone is the new prayer book. Note how it isolates her. And think about the red building above - a constant and perhaps even comforting structure contrasted to the fleeting interactions on the platform. Do you get the feeling that this building is an historical element in dialogue with the modern activity of the train station? Editor: Yes, absolutely. Like it's bearing witness to a constant cycle of arrivals and departures. Almost like the building provides a stable reference point in contrast with the ephemeral figures moving below it, plugged into another world, seemingly in transit through real space but anchored nowhere. Curator: So what do you take away from the image, now that you have spent a little time discussing the iconography of urban architecture? Editor: It really feels like a meditation on time and transition – the architecture embodying history while technology has collapsed time, so that the individual is alone, everywhere, all at once. Curator: Indeed, a potent statement about the contemporary experience using very traditional symbolic forms.