We got to know Agustín Leiro through his Instagram and were immediately fascinated by how he manages to turn his continuous and profound dialogue with his environment and with wood in particular into art, “a dialogue that has more to do with the imprint of the tree than with wood as a product“, as he himself says.
We present a selection of his work and texts, which Agustín has kindly donated to us, so that you can get to know him and admire him as much as we do.
“A few days ago a friend asked me to define myself in a few words and I came up with artist. I didn’t think much about it, and guided by his question, I gave myself up to the dialogue. It’s hard to define yourself, what you do, what you do, I am so many things that sometimes it’s hard for me. I am a father, a friend, a sculptor, a neighbour, a colleague, a cousin, a son, a craftsman, a man, a countryman. I have so many roles in my life that I can’t define myself. But if you invite me to play, I like to be an artist, I like to express myself from there, to build from art“.
“What’s the point of portraying a flower, what’s the point of doing what we do, if nobody needs it. But you can see that something in me can’t go through life without trying. Something in me has the urge to create. This is where I am happy, where my soul expresses itself freely. And the freer I feel, the more here I am, the more earthly, the more beautiful. Everything makes sense to me in art and at the same time is so insignificant that it never ceases to amaze me“.
“I’ve been working on the shapes for 10 years now, the pieces are taking on character and growing, and so am I hahahahaha. The workshop is productive and we are building a team that is getting stronger day by day. We are working with clear objectives and some not so clear, because it is never so clear in this field, but things are happening with confidence and work. We have some fun things coming up, like participating in a competition that I’m very excited about. We are also preparing pieces to send to Casa Foa Córdoba. We are always working on new pieces, which are raising the scale of what we have been doing. Working with great and creative designer friends and those who are always with us“.
Flight
“It’s a piece I’ve been working on for four years now. I remember that the first ones were very nice and it was beautiful how quickly they went away. It was like coming out of the flat and rising up. I had been making boards and these pieces were the first ones that took flight, if that’s a redundancy. Today it’s a piece that I really enjoy making, each time I found more volumes and more sense in it. Although it’s always nice to go back to the path I’ve walked, to go back to the essence and to be able to see the work I’ve done.”
“The Vuelo have reached an interesting level of maturity. They are simple pieces that look incredible in the environments. The dialogue between matter and form became concrete, those passages where the piece is strangled to give way to the visceral gesture, those contractions or stretches, that ambiguous dialogue of wanting to rise up and be so well planted. I think these pieces represent the long road to the concretion of something, material or not. I don’t know yet, but I know there is something concrete here“.
Wild
“Series of wall pieces carved in wood inlaid with pine needle. A dialogue between body and soul.Wild because that is who we are. Wild because it is in us. Wild because we love nature deeply“.
Solar
“This piece is made on Lamberciana wood. Coco is a local sawyer who knows a lot about wood. He knows how to treat it, he knows how to cut it and he knows not only a lot about the wood that is available here, but he knows a lot about all types of wood. When you talk to him he pulls out his little book of wood characteristics that contains who knows how many different woods. These attitudes as I always say are reflected in the piece, not to mention that when I went to buy this piece of wood from him, he told me where it was from, the branch of a pine tree that he had to prune because it was already over a house and from which he asked permission. Then he came to the workshop and we highlighted that dialogue, I think Coco is part of this beautiful piece as well“.
Mushrooms
“This piece is made on lamberciana wood at the base and the form that rises is kiri.
These are the pieces that give way to new sculptures, new forms. Key designs of the studio that are expressed and give way to other proposals. Today it was selected, along with other pieces, for an exhibition that will be touring other countries 🙌🏻💫 When I’m a little further along I’ll tell you a little more about it. But now we can celebrate this great achievement. Here I read you, what do you think of the piece ? !〰️☺️
“These pieces started out as a kind of flower. When I presented them at an exhibition here in sheet metal, everyone started to tell me that they looked like mushrooms 🍄. Today, this Setas series is what it is, a beautiful path I have been following, a path of learning that takes shape in each work. What is the work itself, if not the intention of a maturing process of art, the intention of communicating a beautiful planet, full of beauty and wisdom” ✨.
Earth
“Shapes that express themselves through simplicity and movement. Wall hanging piece.I am excited to make these works, it is a super simple piece but at the same time so expressive that is where I find the challenge, the series began as a kind of tray and how everything was deformed until it began to take the walls, today it is one of the most requested pieces of the workshop and that fascinates me. How something so simple can be so forceful, it will be the magic of the movement itself expressed in this noble material“.
“Earth in wood by Kiri 〰️🤎
Nature as inspiration 〰️ The forms are always in dialogue with the nature that surrounds me. Hanging Earth pieces, I thought the three of them hanging together, generating movements and sound when they touch each other”.
“Detail of an Earth 〰️ At the time of making it, it was hard for me to sacrifice the simplicity of these pieces, the clean dialogue where only the shape and the grain speak. But the thickness of the wood demanded it and so did the desire to see something new. So I began to introduce shapes within the shape, which led me to a different dialogue where light takes on much more importance and breaks with the simplicity but without making the piece too sophisticated“.
Tables
“I always go back to making tables, I find it a conceptual and artistic piece. Gastronomy has always been a part of my life. In my grandfather’s business we repaired cookers, heaters and cookers. Fire 🔥 was always present. Wood appeared later and today everything follows its path. That’s why I always like to go back to these pieces. They connect me to it just as ceramics and clay do today.
The boards are part of this dialogue that I have been working on for ten years now. I really enjoy making them and know that it’s a piece within the whole accessible “☺️
Bank
“This bench is part of a series of furniture we have been working on in the workshop. The legs are pieces of blue cedar tree and the top is made of jequitiva. We are developing furniture as expressive products, working on emerging concepts, combining pruned wood, pieces from lumber yards and recycled wood such as pinotea“.
Libraries
“Finally I can show you the three models of bookcases we developed. There are three shelves, two shelves and just one.
They are made with recycled and carved pinewood shelves, which I love, because pinewood expresses itself in its veins and curves. The shelves are made with hardwoods (incense, petiribi, anchico). The idea is to play with the wood we find available”.
Tray
“I have been working with local wood for a long time. This tray is made on Lamberciana cypress wood. This is a very big tree I had at home, which I had to have pruned and then sawed. I used it to build several pieces of furniture for the house and the hut. There is also a tray that is available and it is a beauty” 😉〰️✨
Texts and photos: Agustín Leiro.
Shutter photo: Carolina Francino @franzicarolina.
Project by Agustín Leiro
