jordicasanueva
Overview
Jordi Casanueva, known online as @jordicasanueva, is a contemporary Spanish artist based between Madrid and Seville whose practice seamlessly bridges the analog and digital realms. Working primarily in black and white, he produces intricate ink drawings, watercolors, and pixel-based works that probe the boundaries between precision and spontaneity. With a background in design and human-computer interaction, Casanueva approaches art as both a meditative ritual and a technological exploration, creating series that accumulate over time—often exceeding one hundred pieces—to form expansive visual archives of form, memory, and contemporary life.
His public persona on X and personal website reveals a dedicated practitioner who shares works in progress alongside reflections on process, pandemic isolation, and urban existence in Spain. Casanueva’s output resists easy categorization, oscillating between meticulously ruled geometric abstractions and freer, gestural explorations. This duality reflects a broader inquiry into how traditional media can converse with digital tools, positioning him as a thoughtful voice in today’s hybrid creative landscape.
Artistic Style & Medium
Casanueva’s signature style is defined by monochromatic restraint and meticulous line work, executed with ink pens, curved rulers, and architectural drafting tools on high-quality cotton paper. His drawings often feature dense networks of lines, grids, and organic yet controlled forms that evoke both technical schematics and abstract topographies. In series such as Estudios Formales (2015), he generated more than one hundred variations on a single format—27.9 × 38.1 cm sheets—each exploring subtle shifts in density, rhythm, and spatial tension through repetitive, freehand yet rule-guided gestures.
Complementing these analog works are his digital explorations, including pixel-art NFTs in the Mayrit series honoring his Madrid life and the 240-piece Strange Days sequence of 2022, created as daily doodles during personal upheaval. Watercolor pieces in red and blue (R/B Watercolours, 2020) introduce rare chromatic accents while maintaining his disciplined approach. Whether rendered by hand or algorithmically assisted, Casanueva’s media consistently emphasize texture, negative space, and the interplay of mechanical precision with human imperfection, resulting in visually hypnotic surfaces that reward prolonged viewing.
Influences & Themes
Casanueva draws from the rich tradition of Spanish geometric abstraction and constructivism while incorporating influences from technical drawing, cartography, and early computer graphics. The architectural tools he favors echo the rationalist aesthetics of mid-century design and the systematic approaches of artists like Sol LeWitt, yet his results feel more intimate and accumulative. Urban motifs—antennas, city grids, and everyday objects—recur as metaphors for connectivity, surveillance, and the layered histories of places like Seville and Madrid.
Recurring themes include isolation and resilience, most poignantly in the FIN series produced during pandemic lockdowns, and the tension between analog authenticity and digital replication. His work often meditates on memory and repetition, transforming personal routines into collective visual languages. The black-and-white palette underscores a philosophical stance: stripping away color to reveal underlying structures of perception and emotion in an increasingly mediated world.
Notable Works & Exhibitions
Among Casanueva’s most significant bodies of work is Estudios Formales, a monumental suite of over one hundred abstract ink drawings from 2015 that established his reputation for sustained serial production. The Antennas series employs technical instruments to map ethereal, antenna-like forms, while FIN captures the introspective intensity of confinement through delicate ink traceries. Digital highlights include the Mayrit NFTs and Strange Days, the latter comprising 240 pieces that function as a visual diary of crisis and recovery.
Though primarily active through his website and social channels rather than traditional gallery circuits, Casanueva has shared works via platforms like Raster.art and participated in online exhibitions and print editions. Pieces such as the large-scale Sevilla 5G 92 ink drawing on Canson cotton paper demonstrate his capacity for ambitious, site-responsive compositions. Limited-edition prints and self-published series further extend his reach, allowing collectors to engage directly with his evolving archive.
Impact & Recognition
Casanueva occupies a distinctive niche in contemporary Spanish art by modeling a sustainable, process-driven practice that embraces both heritage media and emerging technologies. His consistent output and transparent sharing of methods have cultivated a dedicated following on X and among digital-art enthusiasts, inspiring others to explore hybrid analog-digital workflows. By foregrounding black-and-white abstraction amid a colorful, image-saturated era, he contributes to ongoing conversations about restraint, materiality, and the poetic potential of systems.
Recognition has grown steadily through features on artist platforms and direct collector engagement via his site. Casanueva’s emphasis on series as living archives—rather than isolated masterpieces—offers a compelling model for artistic longevity in the 21st century. As both designer and fine artist, he exemplifies the porous boundaries between disciplines, leaving an enduring mark on viewers who find in his precise yet soulful lines a mirror for the structured chaos of modern existence.