The pieces comprising Germán Bobe: Early Works express romantic exuberance painted in the electric vibrancy of cathode rays as well as longing restraint illuminated in soft sepia-tones and black and white chiaroscuro. The videos are often simultaneously joyfully campy and intensely serious. Bobe mixes religious iconography and mythological imagery with queer sensibilities and classic cinema aesthetics to create beautiful and moving artworks.
Germán Bobe spotlights ideas behind fundamental human experiences such as the human body, gender, sexuality, race, ethnicity, religion, politics, and Western colonialism. While young, his family left Pinochet's Chile and he spent his childhood and adolescence Libya, Italy, the Netherlands, the United States and Argentina. The works presented here were created around the time of his return to Chile which was then a nation emerging from 17 years of dictatorship. It was a time of exploration and expansion for all the country's artists.