Mario Davalos’ work unfolds from a sustained inquiry into the moral and perceptual framework that organizes contemporary life. Capitalism is understood not only as an economic system, but as a logic that places technique before thought, efficiency before meaning, and profit as a moral measure.

For Davalos, this framework has profoundly altered our relationship with nature. The natural world is no longer approached as origin or mystery, but as a reserve of energy, something to be managed and optimized. Humanity no longer belongs to the world; it administers it. This condition becomes a central tension within his practice.

His paintings start far from the studio, with field experience in remote, wild places, especially the Alaskan arctic. In his landscapes, water, land, and vegetation appear as charged substances rather than descriptive elements. His works explore how nature becomes a product and is replaced by simulations of itself.

In this process, a specific form of beauty is lost: the sublime. Natural beauty does not stimulate desire; it displaces the subject. It demands reverie: a slow, non-instrumental attention in which perception opens without intent to use or possess. Painting, in this context, functions as an interruption. It resists speed, spectacle, and immediate legibility. Within the residency at GlogauAIR, time and distance become essential conditions, allowing the work to move away from production, toward listening, presence, and sustained attention.