Hippos are known for being among the most dangerous animals in the world due to their aggressive and unpredictable behavior. One may ask about the importance of this in correlation to Camilo Restrepo’s art, and the answer lies about 100 kilometers east of Medellin, Colombia. Hippos were introduced to Colombia by then-notorious drug trafficker Pablo Escobar Gaviria. Today, they resemble, represent, and mystify everything that surrounds a failed war on drugs and the essence of Camilo Restrepo’s work.

Camilo’s work speaks to a broken system and the elusive search for a utopia free from drugs. This realization began at an early age. By five, Camilo had seen his first corpse, a victim of drug violence, on his way to school. The bus driver made the children get off to witness the scene, marking a Halloween where Camilo, dressed as a superhero, realized he couldn’t bring the dead body back to life. Such encounters continued, giving him a front-row seat to the devastating effects of the drug war and the relentless cycle it perpetuates.

Art became Camilo’s therapy, a way to expunge the violence, deaths, and frustrations he experienced. Initially studying engineering without passion, he eventually discovered a love for photography, working as a wedding photographer to support himself. His breakthrough came when he attended CalArts in California in 2011. At first the mere thought of attending was excruciatingly painful and distressing. He felt lost, afraid, anxious and insecure about leaving what was known, for the void of a program he felt he couldn’t do well at and would just end up just embarrassing himself. With the help and support of his longtime partner Catalina, he undertook this new challenge.

Carlos Restrepo art on display. Photo courtesy of: La Cometa Gallery

At CalArts, Camilo discovered that the traumas he had suffered were rooted deeper than he ever contemplated, stemming from his feeling of unworthiness he experienced suicidal thoughts, sever anxiety and experienced a deep crisis. A new counselor helped him begin healing. He described his time at CalArts as a shamanic journey filled with pain, suffering, and, eventually, creative freedom. Creating extensive drawings that symbolized his process of rebuilding himself, culminating in an exhibition in which he expressed his true self without fear of judgment or pain.

In his words, “first semester was pain and suffering, second was in the studio to create and dismantle my thoughts. The third semester I began to draw in one page, when it was full I attached another one, and then another one. It ended up as a drawing of 5-plus meters long. It was about nothing, it was just about what was in my head, a symbolism of rebuilding myself. It was the first time I started creating a safe place for me. A place of freedom and nonjudgment. It was a journey about trying to reveal the pieces I had to dismantle and rebuild. The fourth semester was the consolidation of this process of radical change.” At CalArts he exhibited a beautiful paperwork about the act of erasing, and how you could try to erase something, but doing it over and over will leave a mark behind, as Camilo thinks back “When I saw that I realized I was aestheticizing my pain. I realized I’m going to dismantle my need for perfectionism and obsessive thoughts.”

To Camilo, it is his moral duty and obligation to bring attention to the fact that we still have a war on drugs in Colombia. To realize that the war on drugs will never eradicate distribution and consumption. The unstoppable consumption by the world fuels this, and the only way to find a solution is drug regulation instead of prohibition and to have conversations and education. Same solution for the utopia of the perfect self: To speak with people who share the same fears and those who don’t. To be able to say, I have the same problem as you, but I have never told that to anyone. It could be a massive change in society because people will begin to open up, share, and unload the pressure on their shoulders, becoming a snowball conversation about vulnerability and mistakes. We must understand that defects are not mistakes but particularities that make us unique. “We are not perfect; we are mistakes with legs. Perfection would be like machines and robots. What makes us imperfect also makes us fall in love with others and different qualities.” To treat ourselves with violence only creates a bigger problem ‘a head filled with erasing residue.’ On a deeper level, whether he realizes it or not, his works also speak about the importance of advocating for mental health and the imperative importance of embracing acceptance to begin a path towards healing.

Camilo in his studio. Photo courtesy of The Artist

PM: How can you describe the effects on your well-being of growing up in the middle of a narco-war?

CR: Finding dead bodies on the street, seeing people being killed in front of me, being chased by hitmen for months, escaping a massacre in a bar where, staying at my house while its windows were blown out by bombs, witnessing a friend being kidnapped by a guerrilla group are things I don’t wish on anyone. They created a permanent state of alertness, which was, and sometimes still is, very exhausting. It is like a kind of paranoia in everyday living.

I think my generation is a traumatized one. We were afraid of hanging out as it was possible never to return home. We distrusted other people as they could suddenly harm us. We had a sense of the fragility of life as it could easily end by violent means.

PM: You’ve stated that drawing without knowing how to draw manifested your desire to live an imperfect life. Why was this important to you?

CR: Drawing without knowing how to draw was what let me realize that one can live a life free from the ideal of perfection, free from believing that there is only one way to make things properly. It allowed me to let go of constant dissatisfaction, as I always regretted my past decisions to achieve a perfect future—something that endlessly shifts, like the horizon, when pursued.

Hippo 1 Courtesy of: The Artist

PM: How and when did you come to this realization?

CR: It happened when I was 38 years old, and it was a profound crisis when I was in the first semester of an MFA at CalArts in 2011. In the middle of a lack of ideas, depression, and anxiety, I started to draw, in a small sketchbook, childish and “imperfect” representations of a head –my head– with a red balloon inside, inflated by myself. I erased the balloon, colored it red again, and repeated this process many times. In the end, the reddish residues of the eraser were larger and heavier than my drawn head, and the head was damaged by that repetitive and violent act performed on it. I then realized that the more I tried to get violently rid of my thoughts, the more disturbing they got. It was made with clumsy drawings through which I could convey ideas and express myself in the middle of despair and desperation.

PM: You rigorously process some of your artwork. This includes scalping, using pressured water, folding, unfolding, marking the works, partially destroying, reconstructing, etc. Do you find that this represents life itself for humans?

CR: Yes, totally. Pressure gives us form but also can deform us to the point of making us explode. Those processes are all about wounds and scars and reconstruction after devastation. They are closely related to the violence in Colombia and to obsessive and self-destructive thoughts and how to handle them. That is why I usually use paper: how external forces affect it. It is very fragile but sometimes it appears really resilient at the same time.

Photo: Portray Magazine

PM: What is the closest individuals can come to achieving balance or perfection within the utopian ideals of the perfect individual and a world free of drugs?

CR: It could be achieved if perfection is not understood as a unique way to make things or live a life. Instead, we know it as making things or behaving with good intentions, without comparing ourselves with others, and learning from what we have made or are making.

PM: Your work is very varied. Whether you display sculptures of hippos or apparel used by jailed Narcos and thugs, it is full of colors, different characters, and varying mediums. How do you come up with all these other ideas?

CR: Using sketchbooks/journals is very important. I’m constantly writing and drawing ideas on them. Reading a physical newspaper every morning and clipping parts of it is also relevant. I’m not uncomfortable asking myself questions and looking at phenomena from different angles. Conversations are also a fundamental part of my art practice. A work of art that doesn’t create conversations around it is dead.

The question for me is how ideas are best represented. A possible answer is that ideas choose the mediums they need to become tangible. Materiality is vital to convey them, whether a code of ones and zeros on the blockchain or a crumpled and uncrumpled paper with the texture of a used and abused bill.

Paintings inspired from Jailed Narco Apparel from the clothes some wore in their Mug Shots. Photo: Courtesy of: La Cometa Gallery

PM: Do you ever work on canvas?

CR: No, and I have often wondered why I am unwilling to try it, but I always come to the same conclusion: time and fragility. My head goes fast, and working on canvas is slow. The other reason is that I tried paper as if it had sculptural properties. It suffers more from the forces applied to it, like the ones you have already mentioned. The visibility of violent marks is very important in my process. Canvas is much stronger, which could be contradictory to the ideas I work with. But you never know: There could come a day when working on canvas corresponds with what I want to convey. Let’s see…

Beyond the beauty of his intricate works the most important aspect of our time with Camilo was the conversation discussing mental health and how it is ok to take medication, how it is ok to want to find better ways to relate to others and connect with other people.  He considers himself a new person and new artist. Nevertheless, perhaps unknowingly, he is most importantly a voice for those who are forging their path towards harmony. Ultimately, he has transformed and has found balance within himself “I still use medication, I do not think I can live without it, the demons that are my friends right now, If I stop medications, they start to be my enemies. I don’t have a problem accepting that I take psychiatric drugs, I can relate to other people in a peaceful way.”

Tight Rope Ink, water soluble wax pastels, tape and saliva on paper. Photo Courtesy of the Artist

Camilo’s work underscores the absurdity of self-inflicted violence and the need to embrace our imperfections. He advocates for vulnerability and openness, encourages society to share burdens, and acknowledges that our imperfections make us all unique. Treating ourselves with kindness instead of violence can usher in a profound transformation in one’s life. Whether or not he realizes it, his path and bravery have ultimately made him a true superhero.

Camilo is represented by La Cometa Gallery and Steve Turner Gallery, Los Angeles. His new exhibition will be with La Cometa Gallery, Madrid, “Cocaine Hippos Sweat Blood” beginning September 12th, 2024. He lives in Medellin, Colombia with his love Catalina.