Yeray.

This print captures what you can see: a yellow canary facing forward, with all the color spent on the blue cap and pastel-block sweater, against a plain background. I created it looking straight ahead, with nothing around it: on a wall it holds its own. In his story, Yeray has had a small stall of his own in the La Laguna market since he was twenty-four; he built it himself, bucket by bucket, and every dawn he steps back to look at it before opening. That quiet pride in a well-built stall doesn't fit in the print.

The one who taught him to see was his grandmother, who never pointed at things by their name but by their color: the red geraniums in the courtyard, the purple bougainvillea on the wall, the yellow fruit at the neighboring stall. Yeray doesn't collect objects, he collects combinations. That's where a line comes from that he tosses off while wrapping, without a second thought: "Good color, and one extra." The color first, because that's what he's good at; then the spare stem he gives away. Hung on the wall, this portrait carries that way of looking. If you want the rest, you'll find his story on the character page.