Art
METAMORPHOSIS OR RIVER OF LIFE TO ÁNXELES PENAS When I think of sculptures I always remember the works of Michelangelo in Florence, in particular the marble blocks that he left unfinished, where we see how the figure emerges from its amorphous interior. This can be seen better in a sculptor, than in any other artist, when he works with wood or stone. When the sculptor does this work, he becomes a creative god who manages to transform matter. The report takes shape. The unreal becomes reality. The non-existent arises. The dead comes alive. The Heraclitian, the incessant change, the death and the life are fulfilled. In short the "panta rhei", the whole flows. We are what we are, and maybe part of what we were, and certainly part of our ancestors, pure genetics of the body, and also of the spirit. Ánxeles Penas goes to the source of his memory, the one that belonged to his grandparents, the Galician "bayuca" (1), framed in the environment of the mythical serra da serpe (2). There in total solitude he reconstructs his ruins, the house, the alpendre, the granaries, the cultivation of the field, the planting of trees. And books, many books. There he allowed himself to be inhabited by the "spirits of the forest", as he calls some of his sculptures of direct carving, in woods that were part of furniture or buildings, which were abandoned in the open until they rotted, and which had to begin by devastating, until arriving at the unfading heart as if they were ebony, to save them and give them new life. Then the gouge was making furrows, roads, rivers, a world of signs, of graphism as hieroglyphs, a polyglot reading map, only accessible to some. Small sculptures that do not reach the meter, but that can be large totems, potential trees because trees were. The world of symbols is very important in his work, both plastic and poetic, and also of life, since in this artist life and work form a whole. Tree as a symbol of the tree of life, of the cosmic tree, of the axis mundi (2), sefirotic tree, ancestor tree, generator tree, phallic, life giver, in short a sacred tree. And always as a sign of elevation, of continuous evolution, of spirituality. The polychromy in direct sizes occurs from a dream in which the artist walks through a forest of colored sculptures, so beautiful that she feels unable to define them, in a Mexico, perhaps Toltec. Dream that manages to transform reality and that, like all creation, arises from chaos, confusion, desire, power of the will. And what better place to be reborn, to reincarnate than in Galician, megalithic, playful and pagan land. These sculptures, imagined in giant totems, the size of a natural tree, remind me of Ibarrola's "forest of Oma", only that it is only painted and not sculpted, although Agustín is also a sculptor. The other sizes are by assembly. I think that the aesthetics and the technique of the artist have intervened in them, unlike in direct carving, where there is more intuition. And although both participate in the set of creative making, in some there may be more predominance of one than the other, and vice versa. All of them sculptures that take life after undergoing a metamorphosis, to rescue forgotten things from oblivion, to achieve that in that artist's transformation they gain lost dignity, and sometimes we even achieve, by observing them, to sense a breath, invisible but real, that never they lost The title that Ánxeles Penas gives to this exhibition Experimentos y Matrices is significant. The artist rescues from oblivion old woods, papers already used and discarded, experiments with them, seeks the intervention of chance, of play, of surprise. Fragments of experiences appear, old memories of childhood, forgotten dreams, that which the unconscious holds and which serves to construct our imaginary, sometimes in spite of oneself. All this goes to the atanor, to that matrix or belly where all the transformations take place. Before speaking about the engravings, it is worth remembering that the artist did the different masters, in all the techniques, in the International Center of the Contemporary Print of Jesús Núñez, in Betanzos, where the best specialists in Europe teach. What shows here, except for some xylography, are those matrices made with additive techniques, manipulated papers and cartons, where the combinatorial art intervenes, keeping in the whole of the composite image the total expressiveness of the cuts. We are surprised by these matrices where we see cartons in folds, embossed, small fragments of fabric, papers ... even confusing us and making us believe that they are paintings with collage more than the plate from which the prints came, discovering the truth only after intense observation. In these compositions, perhaps more than in the sculptures, one can see in the titles that symbolism that underlies the work: Emerging door, In the center flowers the flower of Tau, Alphabetic seed, The portal of the seven keys, etc. symbols that emerge from the experience, from authenticity, from the union of thought, feeling and action, which is concreted here in the realization of the work. Ánxeles Penas shows us in this exhibition a work of unity and coherence, of knowledge and mastery of techniques. She is an artist alien to the movements of the moment, the fashions, the dictates of the market, only true to herself. It realizes a rescue of the forgotten memory of the things and of its own experiences, obtaining through techniques, sometimes extrapictoricas, the miracle of the work that arises from the alchemy that the artist reaches, that is athanor in himself, through of its own metamorphosis and the transformation of matter. (*) Scardanelli (Ánxeles Penas, Experiments and Matrices, Ra del Rey, Space for the Arts, Madrid, 2014) (*) The poet Encarnación Pisonero signs Scardanelli's texts about plastic arts. He is a member of AMCA, AECA and AICA.
METAPHYSICAL SPACES TO CARLOTA CUESTA "In the beginning was chaos" Genesis. "Life is a forest of symbols" Malcolm Lowry Who can know what was the passage of time millennia ago? How did the seas and the beings that today inhabit this land emerge? What was the origin, the beginning of this adventure that remains mystery? Beyond myths, legends or beliefs nobody knows if it was a fertile or fertilized seed that brought beings from other worlds; the visit of gods who lost their way; a cosmic egg planted by sages of a star, still unknown to man today. There are only glimpses that show us signs, signs that no one can understand, signs that we do not know how to interpret, but real in spite of the skeptics. Deposits, caves, monumental remains, buried cities, a map of the world only partially mapped, pieces that do not fit, questions without answers. It advances slowly, despite the efforts of those who dare to enter the labyrinth without Medea's help, because as the Tao says "those who speak do not know; who know, do not speak "But there is always who does not rest, who does not sleep, who does not give up and keeps looking for hidden messages, not yet deciphered, because the primal always returns to the sea and the serpent of hidden wisdom. What was that noise that did not come from bells and sounded like disturbing music? It was an intense roar caused by the scourge of the sea, waves that hit the waters and the bottom removing the sand like giant spoons that were digging up tiny fragments of ancient times, impossible to identify. What stories hid those findings, which perhaps came from other beaches, from other seas, from ships that were shipwrecked and lost the north and were now out in the open, waiting for the anonymous hand that would string their puzzle together. They hoped that by the blow of a conch they would tell them the possible stories that they had stopped living in that involuntary funeral, marine cemetery, tomb or common grave of so many dreams. Inanimate objects that one day were part of lives, today anonymous and forgotten. Perhaps fate would end up praising them with a genius without a lamp, a craftsman, a poet, an artist who wanted to imagine, reconstruct or invent a story, even if it was not his, that would compensate for his exile and transport them in search of his lost time. How not to see in these spaces of arid landscapes scenes that travel without direction or passenger until they find their horizon or paradise, as if an invisible hand broke the threads that bind them and prevent them from being real. Remains of an archeology imaginable, precise and beautiful, knowing in advance that they will not inhabit a showcase, because they seek a real life beyond imagining; and also of an improper, imprecise archeology, fossils and non-human mummies or that underwent strange metamorphoses, that are hidden to the common of the mortals, because the officiality does not admit the doubts, the questions and the questions, because they pretend that we sleep in the saint ignorance and the amenes. Remains that were perhaps stars that fell into a crazy night of passion or debauchery, with a blind desire to inhabit another space beyond limits. Then how to recompose the plane, the crossword or the tangram of its history? Where to find the compass, the astrolabe and the compass rose? Where the guide lighthouse? Maybe this trip requires intuition, breadth of vision, flight and the whole of dreams, no apparatuses, launching in free fall, without thinking and with arms crossed. Authentic cities in the open, paths, roads, paths that are cut in the middle of the road to nowhere, but that show a surprising greatness, something of its former splendor: Tarquinia, Pompeii, Phestum, Alexandria or something simpler, that was here in a past that has not been even the name. Do not forget that the gods are sometimes cruel and we can not understand their reasons or whims or simply the game in which they lost the bet that we were. Life, play, art, sleep, everything has its mystery and is not always allowed to understand mortals. The gods consent to what they want and "laugh if a mortal cares more than what is allowed" (1). The desert with its infinite sands and the dunes that today look like mountains and before were waves, that died on the backs of nautilus or horses that had galloped all the seas, and today they endure a sun so scorching that sometimes they turn into a mirror, where the who dares to look at himself discovers other worlds and can find the secret route of silk or the talisman that opens the doors to everything impossible. In this exhibition Carlota Cuesta intends that with the observation the secrets of an archeology without time be deciphered or imagined, through the restlessness that these unidentified findings provoke, that inhabit unreal spaces. The work, study and investigation of a new matter of varied sandstone and wood hit by the sea or torn by the artist, where the color behaves differently than on the canvas, and a lyric that underlies the concept where the worlds enter dreamed or possible, the myth, the thought and the poetry, until getting to dazzle us with these metaphysical spaces. (*) Scardanelli. (Unidentified findings, Carlota Cuesta, Pimental Palace, Diputación de Valladolid.2014) (*) The poet Encarnación Pisonero signs the texts on plastic arts with the name of Scardanelli. He is a member of AMCA, AECA and AICA.
"THE FASCINATION OF THE IRREAL" To Antonio Fernández Molina, Spanish painter, poet and pataphysician. AF Molina tells us "that without believing you can not create, so it is not unreasonable to think that perhaps before the origin was already marked the alternation, the tenacity in the making, Antonio Fernandez Molina. The last names of his parents, Fernández Fernández and Molina Molina, drag him, irremediably, to be poet poet, painter painter, or better yet, poet painter, poet painter. This is not gratuitous if we know that we are talking about a man who moves daily in dreams, where only the spirit tempers the matter until it reaches the tremor that is reflected in masonites, pages or canvases. This maintains a permanent rhythm of restlessness, where he tries to catch at every moment the hunch and hallucination that transform everyday reality into eternal play, where childhood is paradise and all the worlds Peter Pan. And precisely because of that refusal to grow, for the blind determination to be eternally child, is why he keeps his intuition almost intact and suffers anticipations, such as the one shown in a 1952 photo, where he poses with six of his drawings with Josefa Echeverría, who later became his wife, and that turns out to be premonitory, because six will be the daughters that the marriage has. After living with him in his daily habitat, where his permanent activity is a whirlwind that is contagious and exhausting, with hardly any respite, it can be said without exaggeration, and not because Cela said so, that Antonio lives permanently in art and literature, and This is so because he is a poet of life and not just of verse. But this fatigue of body and spirit has the cost of metamorphosis, so, sometimes, hands are transformed into branches and lead to watering hope along with despair "on the well's edge." The forty-two adjectives assigned by Javier Berreiro, in a magnificent sonnet, define this artist well, which is essentially unclassifiable, where he shows us a semblance of man and artist: "wise, cantankerous, sentimental, / difficult, authentic , nonconformist, / audacious, antisolemne, avant-garde, / contradictory, weird, torrential. / Endearing, demolishing, vital, / arbitrary, quixotic, artist, / deep, enjoyment, maximalist, / rebel, heterodox, original./Innovative, cinephile, curious, / unequal, refined, compulsive, / courageous, paradoxical, nervous./ Dispersed, poet, imaginative, / seeker, human, impetuous, / atrable, naive and sensitive. "Which I subscribe fully, although we could continue expanding the list with: intuitive, tireless, independent, childish, compulsive, playful, noble, sincere, intransigent, studious, avid, inquiring, insatiable, creative, good and great, and to put point DREAMER. In literature, it is basically surrealist, but also postista, panic and pataphysical. Proof of this last is the card that the French group assigns it in its own right, in nineteen ninety nine. It also has something of the theater of the absurd. But in all fields we always find a personal halo, which ultimately forces an individualized study. Although he began as a poet and still is, his facet as a painter has grown in parallel and sometimes it is difficult to know which of his two halves weighs more. As a cartoonist, painter and illustrator of books is a naive informalist, close to the naive but without becoming so, despite the fact that this was recognized by Molina himself in its first stage. He has a naive sense of the popular, manifested in gigantism, a sign perhaps of protection and highlighting of the essentials, which gives him a letter of nature and personal stamp, where he is at once critical, ironic and tender. In part it is also surreal, although it does not seem so in a first observation, because it is intuitive, irrational, dreamlike, magical and mechanistic. As constant elements in his drawings and paintings we have to point out the fish, the hats, the church, the houses, the tree, the moon, the animals, the man and the woman, alone or in pairs, bicycle wheels, cars and some big ones eyes, which are sometimes heterotropic. All elements that start from their origins, especially the stay that lives with his grandfather in the years of civil war, in Casas de Uceda, and that recurs later when he exercises as a teacher by people of Guadalajara. The serenity of the mesetary peoples, despite the cultural limitations, broadens the horizon of dreams, although they were years so hard that they left in all the crops the harshness and the bitterness of the agavanza. Cirlot compared him in his time with Michaux, in the sense of the coincidence of writers who paint, and certainly it can not be denied that his paintings and drawings clearly reflect that there is a writer behind each sign, although personally I think that in many occasions the flight and can be next to any plastic creator. Thus we could associate a Gordillo in the metamorphoses, Alcolea in the distortions, Zush and Ponç in the magical and irrational, Chagall in the ingenuity, etc. But there are many comparisons because in the end AF Molina is a hunter who catches the beauty of the most unexpected ways and forms, Orpheus who falls in love with the contemplation of his works, where he has achieved, the most difficult thing that an artist intends, to universalize the seal of the house, so it is identifiable wherever you are. This was interpreted by Cirlot, in his 1972 criticism and José Hierro on several occasions, as interpreted by the galleries where he exhibited, Juana Mordó and Ra del Rey, among other Spanish artists, and the Galerie edition Schoen, in Berlin, where he exhibited with Lucebert , Ionesco and Günter Grass. In his paintings a certain fear of open spaces is suspected, so the figures cover almost the entire canvas, perhaps caused by that wide range of open spaces, which he inhabited as a child and fatherless, where loneliness extends to the horizon, and that they left in permanent hallucination his pulilas. Therefore what stands out most is the richness of color, where the sea of its colors is the amplitude of these plains and thus we see predominance of red poppy, amber and hazelnut; red of holly and chestnut, red of dahlia, of earth and brick, and blood red of his tireless persistence; the olive green, green grass and green water; green of reed, watercress and clover, and green of all the fields; the yellows of the germinating sun of all the crops, yellow of the elderberry and pear, sunflower and wheat; yellow honey, wicker and quince; yellow of bee, of saffron and of barley, and those of all the autumns; the saddlebags of their dreams wear multiple blues, from the blue day to the blue night, until the harvest arrives from the grapes and the sloe. Both in the writing and the plastic has a caligram automatism of palpito to open heart that lets see the wound, where nothing is what it seems, where the meaning is in the incense that is wasted and in the metaphysical tremor of the text. Because ultimately what drives Antonio crazy is "the fascination of the unreal." And so we find his taste for internal rhymes, provocation, play, absurdity, semantic and syntactic inventions, chaotic enumerations, inverted phrases, overlaps, linguistic alliterations, metaphors and all possible metamorphoses. impossible of the manufacturer that is of dreams. Although he has sailed in all the waters, from the classical verse, especially sonnet, free verse and visual poetry, I think that in poems in prose he has a splendid vein in which he should delve deeper. How could it be otherwise, for a man so versatile and so neat, we find a heteronym. Mairena said "do you think that a man can not carry more than a poet inside himself? The difficult thing would be the opposite, that it would not take more than one ". This is how we find Roberto Goa and Mariano Meneses. However I am surprised to have found only two selves in its extensive production, although I do not know if among the unpublished, which is as much or more than the published, this surprise reserves us. Roberto Goa I have not found any work, so I know of its existence only by dating, and Meneses only know the sand of the path, but I do not feel those selves with personality different from Molina, which leads me to think that the bifurcation of his spirit is divided between the plastic and literature. A separate chapter deserves his critical and scholarly aspect, both in literature and in art. Here the artist has a containment that in his creative facet overflows, achieving an accurate and accurate judgment, which give his many knowledge, the long office and especially the intuition of the poet. Discoverer of forgotten names, such as Silverio Lanza, now so much in vogue, of Pizarnik and so many others, as well as anticipating the deserved recognition of names like Cirlot, then ignored especially in his facet of poet, when time has shown the success of his judgments as can be seen in the great work of Bronwyn. His participation in literary magazines is not limited to collaborators, he started as creator and director of Doña Endrina (1951), which reaches only six issues, which has great significance, not only because of the conditions in which it is done, without means of no type, which begins with the right name, as it could not be otherwise after living in Guadalajara and admire the Archpriest, but especially because in it they collaborate names as significant as Silvano Sernesi, Gabino-Alejandro Carriedo, Angel Crespo, Chicharro Son , Miguel Labordeta, Gregorio Prieto, Gabriel Celaya, Fernando Quiñones, Manuel Álvarez Ortega, Manuel Pinillos, Francisco Nieva, and even Paul Eluard in translation of Celaya. The cover drawing was of Madrilley and the poems were also illustrated, which shows from the beginning its double vocation. Everything a miracle! Unforgivable forgetfulness would be not to mention those important magazines in which he had a leading role, as well as that of Cela, Papeles de Son Armadáns, of which he was secretary of writing; Miguel Labordeta, Literary Office, of which he was editor-in-chief, and Almunia from Zaragoza, a name that undoubtedly comes from the town where it is printed, Almunia de Doña Godina, of which he is currently director. He has translated Portuguese poetry, Pessoa among many others, and French, specifically artists who were Janos bifrontes like him, ie painters and writers, as well Max Ernst, Paul Klee, Hans Arp, Wools, and Cocteau in his magnificent "The angel of Heurtebise ". Of his extensive work, where we find a handful of isms, literary cubism, dadaism, expressionism, creationism, ultraism, post-expressionism, surrealism, as well as pataphysics, panic, magic realism and above all realism, it is difficult to show predilections, because in so abundant harvest sometimes the wheat mixes with the straw, but blind would be the one who did not see that it is a promethean that carries the sacred fire of creation among the hollow reeds. If I had to choose I would be left with the scoop of the severed neck, the melancholy visitor, Cantata on the iceberg, Inside a funnel, Tree head, Between the hollow reeds, The initial forces, some of his sonnets, many of his poems in prose, film scripts and almost all his drawings and paintings, where like Wols (probably the most admired painter), manages to capture the vital tremor that is only achieved when the soul is delivered. AF Molina juggler of the brush and the pen, magician who manages that the impossible becomes real, pataphysical by decree and by right, orests between two centuries, the one that paints with both hands, the one that raises problems on which nobody reflects, as Gabino-Alejandro Carriedo says, an unacknowledged Benengeli who "regrets to see how they sometimes ignore him" ("although maybe one day he talks about it"), unique, great and unrepeatable, so that if it did not exist it would have to be invented. (*) Scardanelli. (tribute to AFM Revista Laberinto, April 2003) (*) The poet Encarnación Pisonero signs with the name of Scardanelli the texts on plastic arts. He is a member of AMCA, AECA and AICA.
GREAT FORGOTTEN: Julián Casado Julián Casado's painting goes through different stages, and many consider him a constructivist, recognizing Sempere himself as his teacher. His work is more than absolute painting, like Mondrian or Malevitch, because the essence of line and color has nothing here of deliberate anti-emotional. The perfection of his technique, together with a deep thought, leads him to go further, or further in, so that we could speak of a metaphysical painting where contemplation is not emotion but enrapture, hunch, an almost ecstasy. I would say that Julian has an obsession in a positive sense with light. Not only because light is an eternal theme in painting, that it is, if not for something personal that only concerns him and possibly should continue in the interrogation or mystery. Usually make series of pictures, until a theme is exhausted. So Homage to San Juan de la Cruz, Homage to Malevitch or Random Cosmos. The latter arises when listening to the musical work of Claudio Prieto in tribute to Federico Mompou. But the reason is the least, what is really important is the miracle he gets. Julián studies space and its possibilities. Subdivide the picture into several geometric figures, and the sphere is the common element like a gravitational sun. Taking the random Cosmos series as an example, it plays the possible variants that the combination of two fixed trapezoids and two variables allows. He makes games of lines and planes: rhombuses, squares, trapezoids and triangles in combination with the luminance density of the chromaticism, the lights and the shadows, both internal and external to the volume. Here there is nothing to chance. Everything is measured and calibrated. With the proper distribution of space and the gradation or degradation of colors manages to capture the mystery, what some call the square of the circle, the initiates the sacred geometry and Julian the architecture of light. His works are so powerful that he manages to deceive the observer by making him think that there is a focus on the painting, when it is natural light what he has painted. The professional work of many years leads him to get a I do not know what they are stammering. This and a proper language is what every artist aspires to, and very few get it. His works have a personal stamp that they identify without having to be signed, regardless of whether the signature goes behind the painting to avoid breaking the magic that has been achieved. I am sure that this exhibition will be the most important of the year about a living painter, because Julián Casado is a great among the greats. (*) Scardanelli. (Exposición Great forgotten: Julián Casado, Ra del Rey, Espacio de Arte, Madrid, 2.010) (*) The poet Encarnación Pisonero signs Scardanelli with the texts about plastic arts. He is a member of AMCA, AECA and AICA.
HISTORY OF A UTOPIA Museum of Contemporary Art, Costa da Morte, Corme Porto (A Coruña). Throughout history various writers or philosophers have thought of a utopian society, and have written about it, even knowing that it was not achievable. From the Republic of Plato, the Utopia of Thomas More, which coined the term, the Sun City of Campanella, The New Atlantic by Francis Bacon, The Journey to Icaria by Etienne Cabet, A Modern Utopia by HG Wells, Samuel Erewhon Butler, the News of Nowhere and The Earthly Paradise of William Morris, or The Isle of Aldoux Huxley, man has not stopped dreaming of a better world as possible. Here we do not take the term in the literal sense as what is not in any place (moles), but in the sense of modifying social conditions, that get in time what at the beginning was impossible. It would be somehow to influence events, to improve or prevent our society from worsening, and in that sense the term approaches hope. When the painter Julio Pujales died, Cristina, his widow, soon expressed the desire to set up a Foundation to promote his work, and art and culture in general, with all that this entails. Surprising in these times of such vainglory, selfishness, vain talk and little good work, meet a person like Cristina Torre Cervigón who has shown that generosity, and even more admirable when it has come to mortgage its assets to make this utopia possible, before the lack of institutional support, regardless of any crisis you want, because for certain things always comes the budget. When the Torre-Pujales Foundation Costa da Morte Museum of Contemporary Art was set up in October 2006, I was afraid that nobody believed that this project would reach the port. We have had many difficulties, and we still have them, but above all, the team that has collaborated in making this dream possible, moves us an unbelievable will in the Goethian thesis, which never fails, namely that the will defeats the world. Thanks to the efforts of a small number of people today it is a reality that the Costa da Morte has the first Museum of Contemporary Art. Corme Porto will be the epicenter, because there is the headquarters, but we are born with an ambition of universality, as evidenced by the grants to plastic artists at the international level, which are carried out from the beginning, and we would like to collaborate with the different Councils of the Costa da Morte, offering our collaboration, advice and help to make this area, which has been parked in oblivion for too long, become something recognized for its uniqueness, high vision and achievements, bringing quality tourism to its shores and permanent, based primarily on the cultural offer. We believe that this Museum would be worthy to be in any provincial capital, better that is so. Culture is what makes a people great, and our commitment goes in this direction. The building is unique, in terms of interior architecture, having a staircase made by hand, step by step, something unthinkable now when everything is prefabricated, by architect Carlos Hurtado Casanova (who makes the original project of the Museum), in collaboration with the smith Candido Cancela, as well as the terrace pyramid, that only for these pieces, which are sculptures in themselves, does the Museum deserve a visit. The work of the painter from A Coruña Julio Pujales is in the Museum, in almost all his production, except for some works that are private collection. And the donations of other works of our President Cristina Torre Cervigón have significant names and a recognized track record. If this is added to the fact that it is a collection that is growing through scholarships for plastic artists at the international level, the quantity and quality of works of contemporary art by prestigious artists worldwide will soon be a feature of the Museum. (*) Scardanelli. (Catalog edited by the Torre-Pujales Foundation, and the Provincial Council of A Coruña, 2012) (*) The poet Encarnación Pisonero signs the texts on plastic arts under the name of Scardanelli. He is a member of AMCA, AECA and AICA.
“LA PINTURA ES COSA MENTAL”
A Mª Victoria de la Fuente, pintora.
“Madre, tráigame más papel, traiga todo el papel que pueda./ Voy a comenzar un nuevo capítulo de mi obra./ Voy a titularlo:“A la sombra de las muchachas en flor”.
Cuando Gastón Baquero escribía estos versos finales en el magnífico poema “Marcel Proust pasea en barca por la bahía de Corinto”, aparte del acierto genial de identificar a Anaximandro con Proust, definía la obsesión del verdadero artista como la más fiel compañera, desde que se despierta su vocación hasta su muerte, ya sea para lúdico viaje o tormentoso camino.
El viejo mandrita paseaba en silencio a la sombra de un quitasol, “mitad verde mitad azul”, perdido en sus meditaciones, hipnotizado con las aguas cárdenas de la bahía y la belleza de las hetairas en flor. Y fue en esa serenidad inmóvil como descubrió el enigma del tiempo y el poder de los contrarios, donde cada elemento lleva en germen la potencia de destruir a su opuesto, aunque ninguno prevalezca por completo sino que se impone la alternancia, que es otra forma de equilibrio.
De la Fuente queda marcada e inicia, sin saberlo, ese peregrinaje de doloroso goce que supone la entrega total al mundo de la pintura, en la ría de su Vigo natal, cuando aún necesita auparse a una silla para ver las puestas de sol y las tormentas sobre el mar. Hablo de sus días de infancia en la casa paterna, ubicada ante un privilegio de azules de mar y cielo, de hortensias y de glicinias, y verdes infinitos. Etapa casi edénica para Mª Victoria, según propia confesión, que demuestra dejar un peso y un poso que en el futuro hará que el lienzo sea refugio o búsqueda de aquél tiempo perdido.
El lienzo, esa piel sombra, tan inseparable como la epidérmica, exigente como todo lo que pertenece al espíritu, reclama su alimento de aceites y pigmentos, soportes necesarios para que la mano deje sus huellas y marque sus signos, inscritos con tinta de lunas y obstinación de tea, aunque sólo los vean aquellos que logren penetrar su lenguaje.
Alternancia de tonos entre mares y cielos, los ocres del terruño, los verdes del campo y la arboleda y el oleaje verdeazul de las olas que se encrespan y serenan al capricho impredecible de la luz y la sombra, al paso de las estaciones que avanzan hacia oriente, desde el alegre limón al terciopelo que cubre los membrillos.
Empeño de yunque que nunca la abandona en el logro de técnica, símbolos y misterios, cónclave de vida, germinado desde el inicio en ese mar Atlántico, para dárnoslo trasformado, desde lo cotidiano y sencillo, en pretensión de esencias, exigencia y rigor de todo lo perfecto.
Los grandes ventanales de las casas gallegas, lisos o en múltiple cuadricula, tienen algo de barco y de interior de casa japonesa, en especial en los días brumosos o cuando la lluvia llora los cristales. Ese empañamiento o veladura atenúa la visión y los colores como si de un shoji se tratase, que sólo permite el paso de la luz y la visión ha de adivinarse.
Los ojos ven la luz tamizada a través de esos ventanales que son hosho o papel japonés más que frío e hiriente cristal. Podríamos decir con Tanizaki que la visión se hace tacto y casi terciopelo y aunque no sea fruto de arroz se le parece en rugosidad desplegada y calidez.
La retina esponja inconsciente y voraz que atrapa las imágenes y las guarda en el desván de la memoria, cuánto de mar y cuánto de cielo plegó en ellas, para extenderlo más tarde sobre el lienzo.
La memoria, pozo mágico dispuesto a aflorar sin previo aviso, sabe de sus meditaciones y no olvida que el mar es germinativo, campo de almendros nacarados y dulces violetas que no requieren siembra. De ahí le brota la energía que exige el temple del acero, la fortaleza que requiere cualquier transformación, cambio o metamorfosis: Informalismo, Nueva Figuración y Expresionismo. Firmeza y seguridad para cambiar la forma, sin tocar el corazón de las semillas.
El encuadre perfecto, el marco idóneo, cada objeto en su sitio, y el cielo para soñar la realidad vivida. El pincel toma vida a través del recuerdo, nunca de copias. Del interior hacia fuera toma cuerpo el deseo. Marco idóneo el silencio, el modelo sería incomodo testigo.
Botes o tarros de cristal, vacíos o con pinceles, tubos repletos o retorcidos, óleos derramándose. Caballetes, maniquíes, escuadras, trapos usados, la mesa repleta, la silla poco usada y la ventana siempre. Ventanas verticales, abuhardilladas o claraboyas. La luz imprescindible. Recinto cotidiano del goce y la fatiga, cuyo nombre de pila es la verdad desnuda: rincón de mi taller, la noche en el taller, mesa del taller... Instrumento indispensable de trabajo ya que no utiliza nunca la paleta sino que extiende los colores en un cristal sobre la mesa, lo que hace que esta se trasforme en un campo de batalla y así se manifieste.
La luz como expresión del tiempo, del paso de las horas y sus cambios, del rosicler al negro pasando por la riqueza tonal de los colores. Desde los grandes ventanales apenas se ve naturaleza, las ramas desnudas de algún árbol o unas hojas flotando a la deriva ¡Y no es casual que sólo se den en los nocturnos! El cielo con todos los azules es la visión por excelencia. Ante el milagro de la luz, el resto es intrascendente. Síntesis de la materia, eliminación de todo lo superfluo.
En estos Interiores, de trabajo o vivienda, naturalezas muertas, bodegones, mesas pegadas siempre a la ventana, aparecen escuetos los detalles. Objetos difuminados, casi excusa. Algunas flores, algunas frutas, algunas setas. El vaso, el sifón o la botella como filtro añadido a los cristales para mermar la luz.
En El elogio de la sombra se dice “que la oscuridad es la condición indispensable para apreciar la belleza de una laca”. Las más apreciadas son las negras, marrones o rojas, conseguidas a base de cientos de “capas de oscuridad”, colores estos en los que abunda en su primera etapa, que más tarde dulcifica con él remarque geométrico y el juego de contrarios entre luces y sombras que acentúa el rico cromatismo. Su expresionismo es más de atmósferas que de desgarro y sus formas encierran las líneas más precisas. Las nacaradas superficies, con los blancos bruñidos o enturbiados, los verdes del recuerdo, los rojos del olvido y todos los azules de los sueños son caricia táctil para la vista.
En esos Estudios e Interiores no podía faltar el Homenaje a Morandi. No es sólo la admiración al maestro, es la coincidencia en la síntesis, lo escueto, lo sencillo, el acierto y la delicadeza del trazo hecho sin esfuerzo, la limpidez de los colores. Es el decir lo más con los mínimos recursos, universalizar lo personal, los detalles más nimios, aquellos que todos olvidamos en el rincón de una alacena. Lograr atrapar lo fenoménico y plasmar la serenidad de lo minúsculo pues Dios también anda en los cacharros de cocina como decía la mística de Avila.
Los nocturnos son una prueba más de la elección de los contrarios. La luz transfigurada, sombra de sol y luz de luna, tímido desvelamiento de los objetos que con las mascaras calzadas muestran su lenguaje sin recato. La sombra y la luz son los puntales de su arte y en ellos hay rastros de los clásicos del género, ya Vermeer, ya Turner o Rembrandt.
Galicia por todos los rincones. Medula de su espíritu que transforma en materia, en paisajes marinos, puertos, mejilloneras, barcos y en la dulce tonalidad de los colores. Las tormentas que viera en su infancia, los rayos rompiendo las olas, el rosicler nocturno manchando el horizonte. Cómo no entusiasmarse con los mares de Turner, los barcos a la deriva y en zozobra y esos cielos de vaca desollada, sangre de muertos que engulleron las aguas, venganza de tormenta que los fija en los cielos.
El puerto de Vigo en el recuerdo, retina enamorada que acompaña sus pasos allá donde se encuentre, aguas plagadas de sedientas hortensias y náufragas glicinias y un cielo hambriento de esas aguas, replica exacta del espejo. Como es arriba es abajo, se cumple la máxima esotérica, destino irremediable, se tocan los extremos. Los barcos, su dulce balanceo en la cuna del puerto, la suave veladura y la luz tintineante del crepúsculo, en puro reverbero, transmiten el sosiego que busca el hombre de mar en su retiro. Y estoy hablando de un nocturno.
Nocturno también es El viejo astillero. Hay sombras cuyo fin es ser sombras sin más y ya es bastante, pero cuando Mª Victoria pinta la noche busca atrapar la luz de las tinieblas, tan bella o más que la diurna, y sin duda más hermosa si es crepuscular. El Nocturno desde mi terraza y La ciudad y la noche son una visión arrebatadora donde el tiempo se ha detenido mientras ella pintaba. La ciudad es un hervidero en difumino, los verdes, cárdenos, azules y ocres abrasados han atrapado la eternidad por un instante para el disfrute de los ojos.
Sobre la sombra se puede decir mucho, pero qué es ese algo invisible que sólo se manifiesta ante determinadas circunstancias. No es tema para tomarlo a broma, la literatura y la filosofía lo recogen en variedad de obras. En Las aventuras de la noche de San Silvestre (Cuentos fantásticos a la manera de Callot); en La maravillosa historia de Peter Schlemihl de Adelbert von Chamisso; en los cuentos de Hoffmann; en el tratado Ars Magna lucis et umbrae del humanista Kircher; en la Teoría de los colores de Goethe y en obras y fragmentos de los filósofos griegos.
El hombre ha jugado siempre con las sombras; existe el arte de las sombras chinescas, el teatro turco de artesanales figuras planas perforadas, nuestras tradicionales marionetas y hasta las simples manos juegan a componer sombras certeras en los muros. Y es que tal vez eso que no sabemos qué es ni en qué consiste, que no puede cogerse ni tocarse, forma parte de los misterios de la vida. Y el hombre, ese ser insaciable, quiere saber, necesita saber para seguir creciendo. Y la pintura como la poesía y cualquiera de las Bellas Artes no son otra cosa que conocimiento, en el sentido de desvelar, de atrapar lo oculto, lo que requiere una percepción diferente porque diferente es la materia que lo forma.
El juego de contrarios se muestra también como hemos visto en los Exteriores donde los temas constantes son la ciudad, Madrid especialmente, y su tierra natal, con las marinas, puertos y astilleros. Los dos mundos que ella más ha vivido.
Según Pascal “El hombre no es más que un junco, el más débil de la naturaleza; pero es un junco que piensa. Y aun cuando el universo le aplastase, el hombre sería más noble porque sabe que es más fuerte que aquello que le mata....Toda dignidad consiste, pues en el pensamiento”
La pintura de Mª victoria tiene mucho de reflexión, el mismo hecho de ejecutarla desde el recuerdo y no copiando del modelo nos indica la fuerza del intelecto. Es pintura deductiva no intuitiva. Antes que el filtro de los ojos, que ejercen de tul y de piedra de luna, está el filtro de la mente. Se piensa el adecuado enfoque de los ángulos, la distancia de los elementos en el espacio, la arquitectura del conjunto, la hora del día que se quiere plasmar y la luz a doc para ese instante.
Esas reflexiones meditativas están cargadas de vida, no son objetos muertos captados por la instantánea de una cámara fotográfica, excepto quizá si se tratase de la kirliam que nada tiene que ver en este caso. Son cuadros donde también se ha meditado el sentimiento. “Mejor no vio quien vio lo verdadero/ que yo, que lo pisaba pensativo”, nos dice Dante en su visita a los submundos para indicarnos la fuerza del pensar.
Se equivocan quienes piensen que aquello que procede de la mente ha de ser frío. “La razón es también una pasión” nos dice Eugenio D´Ors y eso mismo nos quería decir la cita de Dante. Iguales consideraciones están en Unamuno cuando dice -lo piensa el sentimiento, lo siente el pensamiento- o Pascal en su celebre frase “El corazón tiene razones que la razón no comprende” a la que replican los Alvarez Quintero “la razón tiene razones que no comprende el corazón”(estoy citando de memoria).
No es casual que los personajes que elige De la Fuente para sus retratos sean filósofos, pensadores y ancianos: Bertrand Russell, Aranguren y Galdós. Los personajes femeninos son mujeres de su entorno próximo, incluso la mendiga de la esquina, La pensionista, de la que observa con asombro cómo aún en ese lamentable estado mantiene la dignidad intacta. Miseria que encierra la grandeza de los espíritus selectos, pues bien decía Goethe “La dignidad no ha de cederse ni ante los dioses”. Son retratos de seres que conoce muy bien y que surgen desde la admiración, el asombro y el deslumbramiento.
La vida interior acaba por reflejarse en el rostro de los hombres, tierra fértil a todos los cultivos donde el arado de la vida marca como a fuego los surcos, las aristas y la palidez de la epidermis. El caso más extremo se da en la literatura con la obra de Oscar Wilde. Por tanto la faz de una anciano es como un libro que ya ha cubierto todas sus páginas.
La atmósfera que reflejan es casi espectral, no en sentido tétrico sino de viaje hipnótico. La sensación que provocan es la de alguien saturado de haber vivido buscando aquello que anhelaba, de alguien que ya ha encontrado la respuesta a múltiples preguntas.
Los personajes son casi traslúcidos, casi etéreos, son “un no sé qué que queda balbuciendo”, tal vez el alma captada en un instante de viaje distraído. Todo ello producido por el juego de luces y sombra y esa reverberación que hace intangible la materia y que sólo puede lograr un maestro de la técnica.
Rostros serenos como de seres que están de vuelta de las cosas a los que ya nada les preocupa demasiado porque están casi en la otra orilla pero que encierran algo de drama y algo de patético. Las figuras tienen un suave goyesco, los blancos y negros son impecables y su acabado tiene la factura de la obra lograda.
El mismo retrato de su madre se sale de las normas conocidas. Aunque sea una obra hecha desde el amor en ella no se refleja la ternura, que es lo habitual en estos casos. Es un retrato poderoso, donde se intuye la energía del ser que lo habita. Dada la enorme implicación con el personaje, nada más fuerte que él vinculo madre-hija, suponemos que ha hecho un esfuerzo tremendo de abstracción para limitarse a reflejar la admiración y eludir el sentimiento. Nadie podría adivinar que esa mujer, casi totémica, es la madre de la artista si ella no nos lo dijese.
En estos retratos se ve que valora sobre todo el substrato de las cosas; lo que más la deslumbra es la inteligencia. Va a lo esencial, no se queda en la superficie. Es también una manera de decirnos, que esos rostros desgastados por el paso de la vida, cargados ya de todas las fatigas, desencantos, alegrías y tormentos, encierran la mayor de las bellezas, la sabiduría que asimilaron mientras buscaban el tiempo perdido. Son bellos no sólo porque en esta serie De la Fuente alcance el logro mayor de su pintura sino que son bellos en sí.
Hay un cuadro significativo por su particularidad y excepción, dado que es la única naturaleza animal que encontramos en toda su obra. Me refiero a El Gato en el sillón. Y no ha de sorprendernos que sea un gato el animal que elige, ya que es el más solitario y pensante entre los domesticados, lo que resulta acorde con sus gustos de discreción e inteligencia. Y considerando el protagonismo que la pintora le asigna cabría incluirlo en la categoría de los retratos, como un pensador de otra especie que ha tenido un descuido en la penumbra dejándose atrapar en lo más íntimo.
Nos dice J.C. Bailly al hablar de los retratos de El Fayum, los más antiguos que se conocen, que “La representación de un rostro singular es como el calco de la singularidad misma: singularidad de cada rostro, singularidad de que existan o que hayan existido todos estos rostros y que en cada ocasión cada uno sea o haya sido el único, el último en ser así, viajando con ese rostro por la vida, enviado como tal a la muerte”. Y dice esto desde un análisis totalmente moderno, entendiendo el retrato “como representación exacta, o que procura serlo”, al margen de quién sea el personaje, ya rey o mendigo, aún ser viviente o habitante del reino de las sombras.
Por lo que sabemos se podría decir que el retrato ha existido desde que existe la pintura, al margen del mito fundacional que relata Plinio en su Historia Natural donde cuenta “unos dizen que fue hallada en Sición, otros que en Corintho y todos concuerdan que fue rayando alrededor la sombra del hombre. Y que esta tal fue la primera”, y más adelante “los primeros que la exercitaron fueron Ardices, corinthio, y Teléphanes, sicionio, sin usar hasta entonces de color alguno, pero esparciendo ya líneas por dentro, y así se instituyó escrivir también los nombres a los pintavan”. Es una feliz coincidencia que Plinio nos hable de Corinto, donde Gastón señala los mágicos encuentros de Proust y Anaximandro, allí donde eran posibles los milagros a la sombra de las hetairas más bellas de Grecia, mar al que acuden los que persiguen la belleza para inundarse de esas aguas donde los dioses se bañaron.
Los retratos son un reflejo del deseo de inmortalidad que, de una forma u otra, todos ansiamos. Por ello no importa que se trate de una persona aún viva o que ya haya muerto, porque el hombre al fin es un ser para la muerte. De lo que se trata es de atrapar el espíritu, captar las esencias para que perdure lo verdadero. Y este milagro lo consigue De la Fuente, en él más alto grado, pues esos cuerpos, algunos casi traslúcidos, son como la transfiguración del alma que antes de la partida pasa un instante por el lienzo y allí queda prisionera.
Todo auténtico creador pone en su obra lo que intencionadamente quiere más lo que aflora del inconsciente, reflejo de su naturaleza, y que él mismo, a veces, desconoce. Esto venía a decir Unamuno de sus nivolas y sin duda ello es extensible a cualquier campo de creación.
La personalidad de Mª Victoria es observadora, reflexiva y crítica. Y esto de alguna manera ha de reflejarse en sus cuadros. Siente especial debilidad por los seres indefensos y en los polos extremos de la vida se encuentran los más necesitados, ancianos que antes fueron niños y niños que pueden ser ancianos.
Los niños son niños tristes en los que no aflora la sonrisa, de rostros indefinidos, presentes pero distantes. Pequeños solitarios, que tienen por toda compañía una muñeca, lo que nos sugiere la posibilidad de que sólo sean niñas. En cualquier caso no son Alicias ni tienen conejos divertidos ni mágicos espejos ni están en ningún país de maravillas.
En los ancianos está la soledad no deseada, la desolación, el abandono, pero no sabría decir porqué me resultan más trágicos los niños, como cargados de mayor patetismo. Me viene a la memoria El niño de Vallecas al contemplar El mundo de la pequeña Isabel, La abuela Rosalía o La familia. Son víctimas inocentes, seres en permanente asombro, marginados del mundo de los mayores, siempre cargados de interrogantes. Seres anónimos hasta en los nombres donde el padrino es la invención.
Las maternidades tienen un no sé qué de abatimiento, no son gozosas, a pesar de ser serenas, se aproximan al desasosiego. Parece que pesaran más la responsabilidad y las dudas que el goce de esa etapa que, por definición, debía ser idílica. Tienen algo de goyescas. Tal vez no sea aventurado decir que esta visión esté marcada por el mundo de las madres gallegas, cuyos hombres o emigraron o viven en la mar y ellas son las que llevan en solitario la familia. Quizá la fuerza de estos cuadros resida precisamente en esa crítica muda que, sin rozar la anécdota, desde lo puramente plástico, unas veces con acritud o crudeza y otras con ironía, nos dice sin decir.
Las figuras son suaves, evanescentes, como si la niebla del paisaje hubiese invadido el alma de las telas, dejándonos una cierta inquietud al observarlas superada, no obstante, por la belleza de su contemplación.
El casi grito contenido de esos niños y maternidades tremendistas, son otra forma de belleza en oposición al lirismo de sus naturalezas. Una muestra más de los contrastes en su pintura. Toda una filosofía de vida.
Desde las cuevas de Altamira o Lascoux el hombre ha querido dejar constancia de su sentir y pensar, nos ha dejado sus huellas, hemos visto su mensaje. Unas veces como necesidad vital o del espíritu; otras por la costumbre o como signo externo de poder; como medio de propaganda política o credo religioso; como alta alegoría o como relajación de las costumbres. Así los techos de las catedrales o palacios, los muros de Centros de Enseñanza, Política o Deporte; los sitios de recreo y hasta la humilde casa. Así los Monasterios bizantinos de Meteora, las Tumbas de Tarquinia, la Domus Áurea de Nerón, la Cúpula de la Sixtina, la Habitación de los Esposos, la Capilla de los Escrobiatti, el Palacio de la Razón, la Casa de Priapo y los Lupanares Pompeyanos, las Logias Vaticanas, que tanto han servido de modelo, y un sin fin de Grutescos que evolucionan desde lo monstruoso primitivo hasta el refinado arabesco.
En el Arte contemporáneo el muralismo renace con la transformación social mexicana. Su tendencia revolucionaria hace que predomine el concepto ideológico por encima de la realización plástica, así Rivera, Orozco y Siqueiros. Sirven de fondo a los movimientos de masas y su popularidad hace que se extienda a países como U.S.A., Brasil o Argentina y prácticamente a todo el continente americano. En Europa el tema es más complejo y salvo excepciones no tienen ese carácter de propaganda ideológica, son más religiosos, alegóricos o decorativos.
Santiago de Compostela, esa pequeña ciudad con sus calles orladas de bellos soportales, la majestuosa catedral, las múltiples iglesias, todo tan contenido y ajustado a la medida del hombre que la hacen irrepetible, hasta el punto de pensar que el vasto peregrinaje que arrastra desde siglos la haya impregnado con un hálito único que es lo que se percibe en cada rincón y en cada esquina resultando inabarcable y siempre nueva. En esta ciudad, en el Aula Magna de la antigua Facultad de Ciencias, hoy de Químicas, es donde M.V. realiza un esfuerzo que no podría creerse si no se hubiese visto.
Hablamos de un mural de ciento quince metros y con el techo curvo. Desafío artístico, personal y hasta físico. Los andamios instalados había que treparlos y esto es literal no metafórico. Realiza decenas de bocetos. Son días de agotador trabajo y noches sin sueño. Pica las paredes de su Estudio, mezcla en un mortero cemento y arena para comprobar cómo absorbe esta mezcla los colores y realiza una maqueta en madera para reproducir la curvatura del techo.
El tema por el que se decanta es alegórico, escenifica el mundo de la ciencia; químicos, matemáticos e investigadores con sus probetas, alambiques y artilugios haciendo mediciones. La sociedad y la familia saludan el advenimiento de sus logros. El hombre, desnudo y deslumbrado, se rinde ante la diosa.
Y con Manuel Alcorlo como ayudante (que acababa de terminar sus estudios en la Academia), emprende esa tarea que tenía algo de titánica en el hacer de trapecistas, el pasar los dibujos al muro por estarcido con polvo de tierra sevilla, para después perfilarlos al carbón con sombreado como si fuese una grisalla y conseguir un primer efecto de volúmenes. Sobre el fondo gris claro del cemento utiliza en las figuras la gama de pardos y negros y un blanco manchado de rosa en las zonas luminosas, reservando los azules para la curvatura del techo que lo transforma en firmamento. Aquí utiliza por primera y única vez el plástico, muy diluido como si fuese una acuarela.
Hay cierto influjo de Sirone cuya obra acababa de conocer en un reciente viaje a Italia y en mayor grado de Henry Moore en el concepto de las figuras y el logro del sombreado de los pliegues nos recuerdan la estatuaria grecolatina. Sin ser acentuado algunas figuras tienen similitud con las de otra gran pintora gallega, Maruja Mallo, y tal vez en la figura del brazo alzado haya cierta concomitancia propia de la época, pero el conjunto es de máxima armonía y el efecto que provoca resulta intemporal.
El equilibrio de la vida se manifiesta en la obra, así nos encontramos que la mujer tiene en esta alegoría tanto protagonismo como el hombre y hay que recordar que el mural se realiza en 1959. En esto también demuestra que es gallega, en el influjo de las costumbres de sus gentes, en la tradición y en el espíritu abierto a la vanguardia.
La arquitectura como paisaje tiene en el mural cierto protagonismo y es una de las dos o tres manifestaciones que se encuentran en su obra, lo que sorprende dado que es hija y nieta de buenos arquitectos, pero tal vez sea uno de esos casos donde aquello con lo que se convive desde pequeño tenga tal asimilación que su sentido se use de manera inconsciente y por ello donde su arquitectura tiene verdadero peso es en los espacios de Interiores.
En esta ocasión excepcionalmente usa el dibujo como paso previo a la pintura, aquí requisito necesario, pero siempre y en contra de lo que pudiera parecer pinta directamente con el pincel y esto es indicativo de lo mental que es su pintura en el origen y de la seguridad que tiene antes de dar sus pinceladas. Lo que quizá le venga de haber trabajado siempre la acuarela, siendo la técnica con la que inicia sus primeros pasos y a la que vuelve de modo intermitente.
Conviene señalar que nada más alejado de los muralistas mexicanos, encuadrados en la vertiente social y de movimiento de masas, que éste mural de Mª Victoria. A esta pintora lo que de verdad le interesa es la pintura, así la plástica tiene todo el protagonismo y lo alegórico es sólo accidental.
La popularidad que alcanza el arte muralístico en el S. XVIII permite que de las Logias del Vaticano se hagan replicas en el palacio del Ermitage en San Petersburgo, donde se reproducen íntegramente la obra de Rafael y de Giovani da Udine. A parte de los grandes anónimos egipcios, griegos, bizantinos y romanos no se pueden olvidar algunos de los nombres que dejaron su impronta en muros que ya son historia. Así Miguel Ángel, Rafael y Leonardo; el Giotto y Mantegna; los celebres paneles de Wateau y antes los de Cesare Baglione; más próximos a nosotros los magníficos Chagall en el Teatro Ruso y en la Ópera de Nueva York, o los de Miró y los Delaunay.
Otros contemporáneos también han tenido esta influencia de una u otra forma; así Paul Klee en su Diana, de 1931; y Alexander Calder en alguno de sus móviles como puede observarse en Tres soles amarillos, 1965, donde se ve la transformación del Arabesco de Claude III Audran, Monería de Marly, de1709.
De entre los españoles más cercanos, por señalar a algunos, José M. Sert, Villaseñor, Vaquero Turcios y Guinovart. Y entre los gallegos Laxeiro y Lugris (desconozco si existen otros significativos en Galicia y si los citados se conservan). Pero en esta lista habría que añadir el de Mª Victoria de la Fuente porque es un magnífico mural que debe figurar entre los mejores y sorprende que lo tengan aparcado en el olvido cuando debía estar reproducido como una más entre las obras de arte a visitar en la ciudad, lo mismo que vamos a ver los Fray Angélicos en Florencia o el de Lucio Muñoz en el edificio de la Asamblea de Madrid.
Dice Mª Victoria que “lo que la interesa de la luz es el elemento expresivo y de lo abstracto la materia, el color y la armonía tonal”. Y hay que creerla pues el color, las luces y las sombras son los elementos sustanciales de su obra sin olvidar la riqueza tonal que viene a ser el intervalo entre ambos opuestos y que los antiguos llamaban resplandor por ser distinto de la luz. Desde el figurativo intemporal de las primeras obras, donde incorpora la materia sin perder la referencia figurativa y el empleo de veladuras para mostrar lo indeterminado, pasa a resaltar la expresividad del individuo con un expresionismo de atmósferas más que de disloque de pincel y unas distorsiones como ajustado desarmónico que acentúan la expresión.
El efecto visual de su pintura, donde a veces sólo emplea una gama de color con varias gradaciones, es de un sensual refinamiento que provoca el intimismo, tanto que a veces molesta la rigidez de firma. Los antiguos definían a la pintura como muta poesis, poesía muda, y mucho de lirismo hay en los cuadros de esta autora.
Es posible que Plinio opinara hoy como entonces, pues cada vez me inclino más a pensar que siempre fueron malos tiempos para las Artes y las Letras; decía que “la negligencia destruyó las artes: y porque no hay imágenes de los ánimos, se menosprecian también las de los cuerpos”. Imposible aplicar esto a De la Fuente ni en el modo de ser ni en el obrar ni en pensamiento. Y debemos felicitarnos por ello porque el lenguaje que elige es acertado como bien lo demuestran los logros que consigue.
El color merecería todo un capítulo dado el rico cromatismo de su obra. Difícil mostrar predilecciones. Los amarillos ambarinos, los oxidados y verdosos, los cromos y gualdas, el amaranto y el albaricoque, el azafrán, el arce japonés y el arce sicomoro, todos resumen de ambrosía de soles que murieron en sus telas mientras el melocotonero y los membrillos dormían los arreboles del ocaso.
Los berenjenas y los moras; el lila y los anémonas; el turquesa, el azabache, el ultramar y el azul verde; el azul pavo real, el púrpura y el violeta; el azul prusia y el marengo; el azul bruma, el ánade y el ángel; el azul Venus, el azul uva, el azul noche y el nomeolvides porque se esconden en los blancos de todos los deseos; el de la lana, el algodón o el lino; el de la leche o el del azúcar; el del marfil, el mármol y los corales; el de la cebolla, la dalia o la camelia; blanco rosa, blanco perla, blanco de nácar o papiro; o blanco ala de mosca que duerme sobre la dama de la noche.
Negro endrina, negro ciruela o de cereza; negro oliva, negro enebro o de mostaza; negro té, negro tabaco, de humo o de ceniza; y negro pez que busca la noche para perderse en los mares del olvido donde encontrar una puerta a la esperanza. Verde bosque, verde carvallo o de eucaliptos; verde abeto, verde ciprés o verde encina; verde alga de mar, aguazur y aguamarina; verde seda, verde de caña o de botella que encierra agua de mar y aire de cielo.
Quizá es cierto que uno siempre intenta pintar el mismo cuadro y nunca lo consigue, por ello incide en sus predilecciones y así puede verse en uno de sus últimos trabajos donde están sus rosas, amarillos y turquesas; los tubos de pintura, el caballete y el taller. Hablo del titulado La pintura es cosa mental, en homenaje a Leonardo, y no es casual que así se llame ni vale como excusa que sea el lema del maestro.
En el magnífico cuadro La ciudad y la noche se derraman todos los azules; ignoro si este predominio del azul puede ser debido al efecto de la visión escotópica; difícil saber el porqué de estas razones, quizá sea simplemente una forma de prolongar ese cielo y ese mar que tanto quiere y que desaparecen cuando la noche llega.
Los griegos cuando hablaban de algo bello hablaban de una llamada al alma. “La belleza siempre es intuitiva. La belleza es a la mente lo que la luz al ojo... La belleza, al no originarse en las sensaciones debe pertenecer al intelecto, y de este modo, al afirmar que un objeto es bello, sentimos un íntimo derecho a esperar que los otros coincidan con nosotros”, esto nos dice Coleridge. Yo sólo espero que aquellos que contemplen los cuadros de Mª Victoria de la Fuente coincidan conmigo en reconocer que es la obra de una gran pintura, porque así es para el que sepa verla.
(*)Scardanelli.
(Catálogo . La pintura es cosa mental. Mª Victoria de la Fuente. Museo de Pontevedra. 2.0??)
(*) La poeta Encarnación Pisonero firma con el nombre de Scardanelli los textos sobre artes plásticas. Es miembro de AMCA, AECA y AICA.
THE DEMIURGE TO ZUSH One of the first striking graphics that are remembered as a child, at least in Judeo-Christian cultures, is an eye framed in a triangle. Few adults continue to develop the imagination of childhood, perhaps because of this the child thinks things of that pyramid eye that they forget most. It is someone who plays and looks out of a primitive window, perhaps a prisoner who only enjoys that bit of freedom or an evil monster that tries to scare us. But immediately they tell us that it is the eye of God that sees everything and then as if by spell the imagination is paralyzed and nothing is seen, there is only a feeling between respect and fear that paralyzes us and a certain anger that it is nothing of what had been thought. Against all odds, Zush's eyes are usually normal, even gentle, generous, smiling but sometimes Porta slips in, silent and ladino, heterotropic cyclops eyes and eyes, and rarely frightened. A palpable example would be in Loveya, where a triangle inscribed in a circle appears empty, in blue, and surrounded by eyes that look at us, between which one juts out at the top of the pyramid with two large wings. Zush's eyes do not scare him, perhaps because he saw so much horror in them that he managed to overcome the barrier of fear and transcend it. Those wings of the eye are not angelic to the divine but of freedom and infinity. Because the human eye also sees everything and so in ST, where the triangle appears again (I do not know if in temporality it is before or after Loveya but it is not important for the case), it is not an eye that frames but a face that could be man or woman. And in Jumenju the eyes appear closed, and with a cross section in the head that brings us closer to the brain without showing it, giving the face maximum serenity and concentration. Well that demands the game. And is that the eye and brain are confused or at least complete as you could tell us the series of 60 Aheads, although some compare it with a game of psychiatrists in the style of Rochar. And in the end the evangelical phrase "if your eye shocks you, start it" Zush would complete it adding: and eat it but never throw it away. Regurgitate it, digest it and return it to your site. The eye is so important in its iconography that the Eye of Horus appears on the flag of Evrugo. The Egyptian god comes from the Maem Misi, from the womb of the world, and Zush is born in the house of the madmen, and there they give him his new name. Horus is the winter sun that all believers adore, and in the house of the madmen all adore the beauty of Zush's work. And here crazy is a generic where all the dreamers and anarchists of the system enter. Theoretically he must be a pure being if he wants to change everything but Zush does not want the changes of a rebel but to be a God. All Campanella carries its own hell and Porta was not going to be an exception. The tortures, the distance of planes, the multiple and varied interferences, the miscalculated medicine, the loss of the wings and the descent, make him stay in Demiurge and not transform into a Christ like Horus. When one is washed with complete immersion, the science recommends drying in this order: first the head, then the sex and third, the feet. The rest is irrelevant. Zush unconsciously respects (?) This order. The eye is part of the brain. The brain is thought and without thought there is nothing. A man in isolation does not exist but can communicate his loneliness. And Zush knows it because his name is a door to open up to other worlds. For this reason he is a utopian, that is his destiny, and he is not only a Demiurge because he is utopian, but because he always dreams of other worlds better than this one where men express themselves with the expression of enjoyment and pain as they please. Thought, sex and art, are the three tools that serve as a catharsis to cope with the horrible and perverse that exists in the world and not be a madman but an i-ló-gi-co according to conventions. In the brain is everything, thought, dreams, desires, the real and imagined vision, and the language that says, tells, proposes, provokes, suggests and acts. The thousands of cables that leave this center are communications that Zush orders to send beyond the borders of Evrugo. Sometimes he speaks with the language of his own state although most of the time he does it with tripping effects, holograms in constant transformation, and digital techniques not accessible to the majority. Simple tools such as supports or materials, paper or fabrics, where it reflects what you feel and think. Without a thread and a purpose nothing would arise. It is necessary that someone give the orders and also that they know what they order. But this Demiurge is out of the rules because it is he who executes his mandates. The female sex is a mouth, the penis is a language, sex is the center and the whole being is thus inscribed in a circle that would be the origin. His mystique is of the body but his art has transformed him into a Demiurge and he as a creator has something sacred even if the world he offers us is not to everyone's taste. When they return from hell, the inhabitants of the mind know very well that their greatest treasure is the Ariadne thread. The pain, the blood, the drops of sweat or semen, the bristly hair, the screams without bell, everything is terrifying in its potentiality and priceless. Neither the change of identity, nor being the Demiurge of Uvrugo, nor being the manufacturer and owner of the tucares will make you find harmony. All these plots are a balm for any victim and this without forgetting the power of sex with its multiple meanings as is proper in a person of such complexity. Sex as tension and relief, as domination and submission, as a whim or game, as an exchange and dreams and perhaps as love, although not always the most obvious is true. In fact among the lamas kundalini is practiced only with the power of the mind and they achieve, with concentration and without any physical contact, that from the base of the column ascend the fluids through it to cross the pineal and reach the brain flooding it with an explosion that overflows it. And so in some Zush brains there are veins that are sperm dancing the dance of joy. Because sex is energy, it is genesic and in what is not lived, it is dreamed of, and it goes through to death because the shame that the hanged people fear, if they are naked, is nothing other than erection. For this reason, the work of Umasido should not be understood as a coincidence. So there is a sex worm and another butterfly, a fecundating sex of ideas rather than seeds for Gea. And against all appearance is a sex for the spirit. But we must not lose the thread of Ariadne and the common thread of all is art without any doubt. And here, if everything is possible, since Metras al Moma can not cover the universe it has created. For this, he eats grass and drinks milk with gooseberry and at night he borrows from hell the wings that Lucifer lost. It is like a pure animal or a hermit that is prohibited reading to avoid polluting his spirit. And just as he does not read, he wants to transmit his messages to us only with images, with impacts at first sight, with unconscious flashes, that is why the graphic that accompanies many of his works, apart from the purely aesthetic function, is intentionally unintelligible. . He wants to reach the center of maximum innocence and transmit his creative act from the blank paper to the blank mind, free of ties and constraints. And between reason and dream, he explores landscapes of worlds yet to be discovered and shouts Anyway, tactactón, brrubrrrubrú, chin-chin-chin-chin-chín and a host of unconnected phrases, which are cybernetic mantras to facilitate perception, with a new type of letter that he calls asura and that is included in the network between the Arial, the New Roman, the Birch and many others. But nothing is casual, although sometimes it seems so. The seeker of harmony knows his way from the first steps. The magic is his paintings, each creation contains a mystery that starts from the garden of the delights, perhaps of the lost paradise, and that travels the life from the own senses of the moment and desire. In Socjomo. The Girls of my Life I, II, III, is in the only work, of which I know, where the four elements represented by animals appear. The land for a pig, the air for a bird, the water for a fish and the fire for man, where the flames surround a naked man, I understand as a sign of purification. Therefore it is easy to deduce that of all the animals of creation the most impure is man and this due to the action of thought that can drag him to perversions. It is also significant that the man is in the whole series in a prominent plane which indicates that he contains the four elements in himself. If we stopped at his works in more detail we surely found certain indications of the triad that I cite as his vital and artistic constants (brain, sex and art), and of course all centered on a single character, THE MAN. And this is not because man is the king of the universe, but because man is a universe in himself. There is little animal, mineral and vegetable world in his works. What at first may seem vegetable, are ramifications of muscles, fibers and organs of the human body They are mixtures of tissues and fluids. They are inhabited dreams that invite the gaze of the curious in case you want to inhabit them. Even man, which is the image that repeats itself in a thousand unimaginable ways, appears, with some exceptions, alone. Because we like it or we do not come alone, we are alone and we leave alone. The constructions are practically non-existent in his paintings, as shown by a tower and a hive. The tower, rather than taking it in the sense of building, must be taken in the biblical or esoteric sense, as a way or way. I dare to say that these roads are a support for his main work and without a doubt refer to music and theater. And if not, see the five pieces of the Esovro series. The beehive has something of a tower, considering this in its most classic form, and in any case it would never be a simple cabin but a whole universe, we would almost say a small City of the Sun, because the bees form an almost perfect society and, in a certain way , the hive can be a symbol for a utopia. Nor do geometric shapes abound, at best the square / rectangle, the triangle and especially the circle. We would be in any case in the key figure, it circle as matrix, as egg, the universe in a nut shell. For this reason man is his inexhaustible source, that is why he is reiterative and in that corporal universe he finds his mandala. It is not surprising that the tarot is among his hobbies because his personal books are cards of cards created by the dreams that flood him, sometimes for free and other times provoked. The game of cards as the digital way, drugs and the world of dreams are dangerous networks where one can be trapped without almost defending. Enter the field of dreams is a temptation with the work of Zush but this requires greater caution with maximum openness to all encounters that previously did not exist or had imagined. And although all his work lends itself to this analysis I will focus only on the series The tarot cards I and II, because I believe that in games the unconscious can emerge better. Among the signs that appear on the cards I point out the wolf, the cross, a castle, a skeleton, the moon, a light bulb, a broken spine and the salamander. The wolf is a sign of sensuality and passion but it is also related to the supernatural, the unconscious and spirituality. It is a powerful sign in the interpretation of dreams and we must not forget that in the iconography of Zush there are very few animals so it is doubly significant. It is also of such a size that it needs two cards to frame it and these two cards are not joined, they have a free space between them where, of course, a wolf fragment is located. What could indicate his escape to higher spheres, to spirituality and art. In addition we must not forget another relation of the symbol, that of the capitoline wolf, that suckled the founders of Rome, and Zush is the founder of Evrugo. The castle is a symbol of refuge for the spirit, the place where one goes to purify oneself, where one goes in search of light. It would clearly indicate to us that it has a marked route and that it follows it. And this connects with the cross that is a sign of sacrifice and effort, because their art is not free. The moon is a positive influence and is inscribed in a circle by what is understood to be a full moon. The moon exerts great power over the liquid, including bodily fluids, blood, tears or semen. These elements are repeated in his work. And ultimately it would be his feminine part and the influence of the mother. The column, in general, is a bridge between the earth and the sky, between the material and the spiritual. It is the union of two dimensions. The fact that it is about the spine of man is even more significant and being truncated would indicate perhaps a great loss or a moment of weakness. Although taking into account the set of cards you have to understand that it is only a bump in the road. And the light bulb is a sign of light, of hope in the daily task and of feeling that it has a guide and a goal to which it is directed. The skeleton is a Vanitas dead laughing that is chained to another card next door with a pyramid sectioned at the tip where a smiling skull reigns. Death does not give him any fear, he laughs at her, maybe because he does not believe in her, in fact he knows that he already had other deaths and that he survived. And to finish the salamander that is the only animal that does not die, able to survive in it fire. Symbol of resurrection, like the phoenix that is reborn among cinnamon and incense ashes. And next to these signs that have more relation with the transcendence and the spirit that with the matter appears the money under the sign of the dollar, without a doubt sign of materialism but also of freedom and power. You need to feel powerful to develop your art. This is really important because we must not forget that he manages to make his own coin, the tucares. The world has taught you how hard the fight is if you do not have protection. And powerful gentleman is gift money. I wanted to point out only a sample of the possibilities of analysis that the field of dreams has in the work of Zush, which in fact has led many to include it among the Surrealists, a movement with which it is related not only in the facet of the dreams, also by games, psychoanalysis, the automatism of writing, etc. And in fact it may be one of the few that shows the drama of these worlds along with Joan Ponç. The world of psychiatry, with all its symbols, is something that can not be avoided by studying its work. In fact, in some painting I thought I recognized a trepanation, which would indicate not only the fear of the possibility of this fact, but also of having your thoughts stolen in some way, even if it is only an imaginary situation. And all because he knows that true freedom is in the mind. Nothing surprises more children and adults than the tricks of the magician. The magic is itself divertimento and also enchantment and leads to think about the creative act because it takes things out of nothing, if only in appearance. Magical is the medicine that heals, the alchemy that transmutes the metals, the music and the poetry that move us from one sphere to another, and the painting that deceives us with the play of lights and shadows, false perspectives and rainbow palette. Magic made the healer with his face, magic is hidden in the tarot of his paintings, magic the graphics of his letter and signs of Evrugo and a forgotten zone of hell. And magic your mind and your brushes that put your ART with capital letters. We do not see why two plus two must always be four and why the most ludic translation can not be valid. The sorcerer looked at the city under the waters and from the inside of the bell he observed, through the holes of his nose, the bustle of the inhabitants of jauja, the new Atlantis of Evrugo. His espionage was not an act of rooting, because there nothing was forbidden, but a pedagogical look to satisfy his spirit and longings for perfection, it would be a shame that so much effort was spoiled by a miscalculation or a power outage in the network . He knew perfectly well that the kind of citizens who moved without feeling observed was more subtle than the common people and, even aware of his utopia, he thought that to make a dream come true one must first dream it. After all, whether or not his company continued, the facts were already an indisputable reality. An artist like Zush everything said so far does not care because the hits he already knows better than anyone and if there were errors I hope he does not expel me from Evrugo, because I feel a citizen of that state for multiple reasons. In any case the best recognition for your work may be to enter the limbo of their worlds and be happy just by contemplating them. (*) Scardanelli. (to the exhibition La campanada, Zush, Museo Reina Sofía, 2,000) (*) The poet Encarnación Pisonero signs Scardanelli's texts about plastic arts. He is a member of AMCA, AECA and AICA.
DAMAS DECEPTIVE TO JESUSA QUIRÓS At rest, sitting, naked or semi-naked, with a slight sensuality or soft eroticism, with insinuation in her impenetrable face, they show a passivity or stillness - which accentuates the hieratism of some - with the lost or dreamy look, in a gesture that reveals a physical and psychic ambivalence, which contrasts with those exuberant breasts and general nudity. It is as if sex is veiled, even in The Three Graces, where there is a predominance of candor, and sexuality is absent even if it is manifested, something beyond the apparent and that is barely intuited. In the look of the other is also manifested hieratism, and that silent look that has to be guessed. The other, although close, is still a different universe and the view, through the water of the eye, which could be a communication vehicle, is not produced here either because the eyes we see have water absent, like those of a figurehead. It is not by chance that the only landscape without a figure, is an image of the sea, almost framed, where water is a symbol of life, purification and regeneration at the same time. It is the potentiality to infinity, asleep, waiting for someone or something to wake you up and give life. It is broadly meant duality. And even if it is unconscious, the predominance of water on one of the faces of Diana at rest resumes, although now it is a lake instead of the sea, as in The Three Graces. Some figure has some intentional clumsiness, which is part of the ingenuity that runs through these paintings in general. The treatment of the hands, on the contrary, are in the purest classic style. The transparencies of water and fabrics that allow to see the flesh are inner membrane of onion or eggshell, muscatel grape skin next to quartz sheet, amberina glass or rock crystal. The color you get in the naked bodies, with a white between linen and lotus, white flame or wilted white lilac, white tuberose or pale narcissus, white wax, white or white pearl, tulle or white silk like white cotton, white nacre or sea salt that contains blue, white of blackberry or white grape, white oyster or white tear, they give the flesh a hunch, and all summed up in a whiteness that is luminosity and life, that together with the carmines offer us the pink flesh maiden . Jesusa Quirós in a game of delight and harmony brings a know-how in the key of classicism and modernity. (*) Scardanelli. (Exposition of Jesusa Quirós, Ra del Rey, Madrid, November 2011) (*) The poet Encarnación Pisonero signs with the name of Scardanelli the texts on plastic arts. He is a member of AMCA, AECA and AICA.
THE HIDDEN WORK OF LORENZO UGARTE (1926-1992) TO LORENZO UGARTE Lorenzo Ugarte, has stages still unknown by the public, such as the present exhibition, in which they expose for the first time what he called black paintings. To understand this black stage of Lorenzo, we must place him in the historical, social and personal situation he was living. Ugarte worked in layout or layout, in the newspaper YA, owned by the Church, specifically Catholic Action. The decade of the seventies to the eighties was full of terrible events (1) but the drama that had the most reach, at least at the popular level, was the Vietnam War, which lasts almost twenty years and ends in 1975. The Second World War leaves a Germany defeated, devastated and divided, and the postwar environment is magnificently reflected by the German writer Heinrich Böll, who will be awarded a Nobel Prize in 1972, and one of his works deeply influences the mood of Lorenzo, Opinions of a clown, which in Spain it was published in 1973. Society in general accuses the effects of the postwar period, whether it is one's own or that of others, it is a society that suffers from the waste of cities, scarcity of food and fear, ... H. Böll calls it " age of prostitution. " And Lorenzo, added to all this, suffers the pressure in his own work, where he sees the abuse of power exerted by members of the Church with shame, hypocrisy and total impunity. In Opinions of a clown the protagonist is the clown Hans Schnier, son of a wealthy German who does not flinch when he sees his son in destitution and who keeps silent about the atrocities seen and suffered (the death of his daughter that he and his wife send voluntarily to the war, that the other son becomes religious instead of following the family business, the use of children through manipulated education, etc.) Lorenzo's wife, Marianne Paul - a perfect companion for an artist - is German, and at night both read and commented on the work of Böll. The economic and social problems, the political and religious repression and the labor pressure that he suffers daily definitely influence his mood, which leads him to almost a decade of depression and withdrawal, as this black series is carried out from 1972 to 1978, and only when he has removed all the disappointment and pain that he has inside, begins to see the light and begins to work on the material and object pictures and to introduce again the color, especially the blue and the carmine. This series was the calvary or descent to the underworld that served as catharsis and regeneration. The paintings lack title and were the only ones of his production that he never wanted to expose, nor did he destroy or paint them, as he often did. In this figuration the soldiers dress in the manner of traditional wars, and as a weapon they carry the rifle with the fixed bayonet. The esparto ropes and barbed wire represent oppression and lack of freedom, and as religious signs he paints: the bible, the cross as a sacrificial log or emblem, the priest, the chalice collecting the blood of a condemned man ... The cross, maximum symbol of Christianity, is an instrument of torture that implies the condemnation of the Catholic Church, as a consenting or accomplice to the massacres of wars and many injustices. The powerful and the falsely important men, are represented always well dressed in shawls, coats and decorations, and fed in excess, in contrast to the destitute, the oppressed, the rebels and the persecuted, who are starved to be able to tell them the bones that barely they support you. They are paintings painted in oil, where there are almost no colors, they are: the tempered blue of the medals and the bands of honor; the helmets of the soldiers in turquoise blue or blue-green and the crimson of the ecce homo, with number of prisoner, in quermes or scarlet; and we should highlight yellow and red, and especially white and black. The red of the blood is bright red, parrot or vermilion feather. The yellow of the ropes, which exert prison, sometimes diluted, and the bright yellow of the hair of some powerful and always the clown and his trumpet, in cadmium yellow or light chrome, gualda yellow, broom or broom flower, Yellow ripe lemon or bast from scarecrow. The white of the bandages, which cover the wounds and sometimes cover the whole body, is not a pure white and even less the skin of the bodies that is white onion or parchment, white of oyster, of sake or cerulean. And the black is only deep smoke, spark plug or ivory in the eye sockets and open mouths, in the grave of the picture "vip book" (with all the blessings of the cross), and in the costume of the character illustrate with collar, bow tie, rosary and breviary; in the other paintings the black is nuanced, varying between black tea, black tile or black grape, olive black, coal or black pearl, to be a charcoal gray or gray black. All figures represent dead, dead bodies or / and dead soul, there is not a single red lip, all are white, white poplar or skull, white rice or clay, white coral or egg shell. And the infinite is in the depth of the empty eyes and the open mouth, direct tunnels to the underworld. However, the color stands out in the set, with the intention of lightening the climax so as not to be suffocated by the strength and tenebrism of the painting, which is more suited to the qualification of black squares than color, a dramatism reminiscent of El Grito de Munch, one of the best dissections of human anguish (although those of Munch are in tempera, pastel and pencil), and the black paintings of Goya (these are in oil), without detracting from both in texture, treatment and composition. Religious criticism is more fierce than politics, although there is the possibility that all the estates are represented in a generic way under the sign VIP, and a picture bears the medal of the Congres, this without forgetting that Franco was under a canopy. Power never forgives two things, innocence and beauty. The latter represented by the white flower that murders the soldier with the bayonet, and the innocence in those bodies that travel to space in small coffers of coarse nailed planks, with an expression of having lived the terror, with the eye sockets of empty eyes. a black abyssal and the mouth in a silent howl that rebukes the sky. I do not want to stop highlighting something that I see in Ugarte's black series, which goes beyond the apparent, and is its transcendence to time. Maybe he captures it unconsciously, as always when an authentic artist gets so involved in the work that he catches what others do not see, either the other side of the mirror, the collective unconscious or whatever the creation is. That painting of seven soldiers, which he calls centurions with helmets and machine guns, suggests that they might well be robot soldiers, since we are in a new era where they are already incipient reality. And I do not think I am mistaken in this interpretation, because it would have to be added, that in the whole series as the only landscape it seems that we are not on earth, but on any star planet, with craters, infertile land, desert of ashes, mists, snowy night and infinite emptiness. And if it were the earth, we would have achieved its total destruction. Maybe it was a success of Ugarte not wanting to expose this series at the time, because today it would seem that fits perfectly with the times we live in wars, terrorism, hunger, social inequality and bigotry. We have retreated in acquired rights, freedom is restricted, the quality of life only exists for a privileged few, we are destroying nature, fear is gaining ground, refugee camps are becoming concentration camps and there is more and more poverty and misery on earth, without doing anything to remedy it. I can not think of better social criticism and denunciation, with a continent and content achieved, than these paintings by Lorenzo Ugarte, unfortunately of raging news, where the human pain in that broad-spectrum black with those hollow eyes and those mouths is revealed They shout at us from the torn entrails, and it is impossible not to hear them unless we are already dead. (*) (**) Scardanelli (*) A relief in this extraordinary but tremendous exhibition are the two paintings that correspond to the previous and subsequent stages of this series. (**) The poet Encarnación Pisonero signs with the name of Scardanelli the texts on plastic arts. He is a member of AMCA, AECA and AICA. (1) Significant events from the 1970s to 1980: terrorism boom (IRA, RAF, ETA, etc.) Gerras (Vietnam, Cambodia, Yom Kippur, Indo-Pakistani, etc.) Invasion of Iran by Islamic fundamentalists. Ugandan occupation. Independence of Bangladesh. Oil crisis. Weakening of the USSR and decline of communism. End of dictatorships in Greece, Spain and Portugal, ...
The age of awareness
a Paz Santos
La exposición de la escultora PAZ SANTOS La edad de la conciencia, sorprende por su actualidad y coherencia con los tiempos que vivimos, a la vez que demuestra el conocimiento de su oficio, algo no sólo difícil de ver actualmente sino incluso denostado.
La pieza que da título a la exposición, un largo banco en hierro, nos recuerda la famosa foto “Almuerzo en lo alto de un rascacielos” de Charles C. Ebbets, llena de personajes sentados, en barro refractario, que en diferentes posturas manifiestan actitud de sorpresa, desencanto o lamento; algunas en actitud de leer como si no pudieran o así parece indicarlo el libro que hay en el asiento olvidado o abandonado, tal vez reclamo de consuelo, refugio o salvación para el tiempo de opresión que vivimos, algo que en Europa creíamos ya superado.
En Arriba el telón, obra de gran formato, a modo de puerta, toda enmarcada en hierro, con plancha de hierro patinado y espejo cóncavo que demuestra la deformación de la realidad, como se contempla en las dos personajes del marco inferior que manifiestan en su cara el reflejo esperpéntico de la realidad. Tal vez invitación a salirse de ese mundo marcado que nos dictan, incluso a enfrentarnos a esa realidad que las normas están haciendo monstruosa.
La otra cena, en hierro y escayola, como contrapunto al clásico cuadro de Leonardo, es la mesa de los poderosos que se reparten el mundo mientras el ser humano se va por el desagüe sin que se inmuten. Escultura que merecería otro ángulo de visión para apreciar todos sus matices.
Hay dos series de piezas de pequeño formato que son composiciones con sillas, entendiendo esta como metáfora de trono o ejercicio de poder; unas en hierro Punto de espera, pudiendo ser una lectura la manifestación del poder real en su desnudez, es decir cuando se ejerce sin abuso; otras son tallas de madera formando interesantes juegos de sombras en sus diferentes composiciones, acompañadas de pequeñas figuras en cerámica, barro o bronce, sentadas en los bordes en actitud de sorpresa e impotencia. Estas figuras son una característica de la artista donde logra la expresividad y dramatismo que pretende con un sutil modelado.
La escultura Gran arcano, nombre tomado de la rueda de la fortuna del tarot, de signo positivo o negativo, compuesta por una pequeña rueda de molino en piedra arenisca, atravesada por una manivela de hierro que mueve un licántropo, también posible manifestación de la degradación que nuestra sociedad hace del trabajo, que en vez de dignificar embrutece.
Y como complemento al conjunto hay unas varillas en acero y cristal de murano, un juego entre vacío y volumen, con esa nota del color traslucido del cristal que sólo ocupa la mitad del cuadro. Nota de luz en esos azulina, granate y ultramar, con la ventana abierta del marco como camino a la esperanza.
Una magnífica exposición y posibilidad de observa como el arte con mayúscula ejerce la crítica social, sin menosprecio de su oficio y buen hacer en todo tipo de materiales y técnicas.
(*)Scardanelli
(Galería Ra del Rey. Espacio de Arte. Madrid. 2013.)
(*) La poeta Encarnación Pisonero firma con el nombre de Scardanelli los textos sobre artes plásticas. Es miembro de AMCA, AECA y AICA.
THE TOTEMS OF JOSEP BASSET TO JOSEP BASSET Speaking of Basset's work, he said in 2006, that he was the demiurge of metamorphosis. No doubt this was palpable in the exhibition we saw on that date in Madrid, where there was a predominance of sculptures in iron and aluminum. The one that currently exhibits, in the renovated gallery, Ra del Rey. Space for the Arts, they are all wooden pieces with irons, steel, brass, sweeping brush threads, motor rewind, typewriter keys, nails or tinted objects that end up forming a body with the main structure, without distract the added spurious, although some are kept in absolute nudity, as if they were blank pages where the participation of the observer is requested. Sculpture, like any form of art, admits multiple or infinite possibilities, and no one can deny the masterpieces that have been achieved with the most unusual materials, and of course a good sculptor can transform any material. Despite this, and this is something personal, I still consider wood as the main material of sculpture, because it maintains all its spatial possibilities, and I would say temporary, with a warmth that transmits it to be living and modifiable material in itself, and that keeps beating after its metamorphosis. The tree retains its vital elan after being cut, chopped, roughed and transformed into a practical element for the most diverse uses. But if this wood, in the space-time variant that it is, falls into the hands of a sculptor who is a demiurge, that is, who adds to the matter his creative breath, then he can fulfill the dream that he slept for years or centuries, and be the creature that lives what is not written, the desire of the creative creator or the innumerable lives that the new fork wants to give him. I can not ignore that, on this occasion, the intervention of the sculptor on the wood prevents the gouge from sending or saying alone, as if its intention was to force the imagination of the spectator, and thus motivates, provokes or suggests that the pine, the carob tree or the palm tree has a life of its own, to which he has given another life and form with those accurate inserts, which nonetheless admit unborn possibilities. This exhibition is harmonious as a whole, and rarely is a work contemplated by the pieces, in their individuality, satisfactory to the eye and the spirit, without rejecting some. Giordano Bruno, heterodox par excellence, wanted to discover the Being of God in matter, and with matter works the sculptor; weight, space, volume; what it is, and what it suggests could be, because matter contains all possibilities in itself. There are two sculptures that surprise by the material, palm wood, something little used in sculpture or at least I do not know. One is Ritmepik II, which has the success of the whole, so in the structure of the face, face at an angle, whose axis is the nose, and the hollow eyes in parallel, which allow ambidextrous vision, and instead of hair the roots themselves of the palm tree, all with a light patina of satin varnish on the hair and matte on the face, which simulate the resin of its essence, achieving the piece a touch of classicism. The other is Ritmepik I, more curvilinear and with less pronounced lines, and with the same symmetry in the eyes. This piece is tinged with a delicate and at the same time intense malvaceo, that is to say bright purple, clear and at the same time strong, neither marshmallow nor hollyhock, rather mallow cake or orchid, but not real mallow. The effect produced by this sculpture, due to its shape and color, distances it from Ritmepik II until it goes unnoticed, in a first observation, that they share the same raw material. Both of innovative texture, in them Joseph Basset at the same time that he pays tribute to the palms, through the title Ritmo in Pik, to make a critique that helps to end the plague of the Red Palm Weevil, which is endangering the palm groves. The whole exhibition participates in the generic title of Ritmos, so Titmocolla has the addition of "colla", which in Valencian is a musical group. Here it maintains the structure of triangular face, with minimal manipulation and hardly intervention of gouges. The eyes, small flat pocket keys, in the distance seem to us frightened by the astonishment of their own contemplation. The testa is crowned by a small army of figures or better band, to the rhythm of dulzaina and tamboriles, the colla, a gesture of complicity to its facet of amateur musician, and of step the harmonic contribution that is common note in all the figures. The composition of the neck, tube covered with paper, gray printed, with orange touches, fits perfectly in the patina that has given to the pine wood, and the trunk has a horizontal extension, highlighted with a darker shade in the patina, which it is the framing and counterpoint that the figure requires. One of the key pieces of the exhibition, although it is difficult to decide given the quality of all, is Ritmodrak. The excuse to make this piece was a carob tree in his garden that was knocked down, and he was reluctant to lose it permanently. A piece of trunk that takes advantage of the curve of a powerful branch, with a diagonal cut to give us the face of this current totem that incorporates diverse elements. By nose an ancient forge latch, whose tail ends at the head of a dragon, hence the name "drak" although it could also be an amphisbaena tail. Forming harmony in the set the most disparate elements: a modern abacus of hours in aluminum, the lips in abrasive sectioned irons, and by hair the keys of an old typewriter, which could also be keys of a musical instrument. Hair in the wind, silent threads of a keyboard that wants to shout its secret to us, a wink that incites and pushes us after the mystery of a text still to be written. Imagination is not a frequent virtue, and according to J. Sauras, fantasy and imagination are sometimes more enriching than notarial truth. Each creator has to find their language but this does not mean that it has to be repeated indefinitely, because in this way it tires the viewer, and his contribution can be limited to a small number of successes. This is not the case of Basset, who surprises us with each exhibition while recognizing their identity. This is what happens with the piece Meceguitar, where he has managed to get an old discarded rocking chair to be an original guitar that surprises us, in each look, the composition and the originality of his new form. In these works Basset achieves the symmetry and moderation of balance that makes us see that the piece is beautiful, as if this time the gouge and the compass had it in the eyes instead of in the hands; first works the thought, then the view and finally the hands, for that reason the proportion of the composure is so important. Several pieces have the diagonal cut of the trunk as the base of the face, and in Ritmomech it is circumscribed by a circular serrated half-saw, with a hoe-like nerve forming the nose. The patina of the iron highlights the tinted wood, which is Chinese vermilion, garnet red carved stone or almandine, also pomegranate grain, cherry wine or purple cadmium red. Basset achieves maximum effect in this sample from simplicity. José Hierro said later that the simple is learned, and that saying the most with the minimum implies having a wide range of knowledge and skills that few reach. In Ritmopeix, fish rhythm, it seems that the name is caused by that fish eye, the other being the only note of color along with the mustache formed by hard brush bristles to sweep. Every creator puts something into the work unconsciously; there is a moment where the author commands, and in another he must obey, if his creation demands it. In this case I would say that the sculpture has been taking solar movement, clockwise, although the cross is not formed since the arms are transverse and separated, marked by that serrated circular saw as a crown, that neither it is not intended, but that gives rhythm to the set, along with the nose that forms a zeta with tiny arms, as well as the lips embedded. The whole piece is directed, unconsciously, by those unidirectional undulations, which cause the observer an imperceptible but real movement. In general the names of these sculptures are due to some of the pieces that make up the works, so in Ritmejake the chess figures that populate the head, all of them from an unidentifiable alloy. If we observe the objects that make up the harmony in the disparity: tap tap, coil spring, iron protector and steel piston, which are tinted in the same tone as carob wood, an indigo, between purple and blue dark, that allows to observe the veins of the wood in the cross section that forms the face, next to the old indigo or glasto, to the purple manganese or aleli, to the eggplant or the wild sloe, the lilac, the lily, the fig or the grape of beach, providing a warmth that nullifies the cold of steel. Not always in sculpture it is interesting that wood grain is observed because there must be a predominance of forms that nothing should distract, but in this case I think it is right to mark these nuances, because I think that the artist here has voluntarily chosen another game, giving expression and content through a composition external to the central base of the sculpture, as we observe in this and other pieces, and without a doubt it succeeds. An old German typewriter, Voss brand, gives the name to Ritmovoss, incorporation that we see in the hair with the keys in vertical or the mustache with the rods without keys, opposed in position. The axis of the face is marked by a vertical line that goes from the forehead to that Nietzschean mustache. The wooden support of the sculpture is dyed in part in a sanguine or red blood of faded drago, as bathed in milk, while the face has a milky predominance with drops of blood diluted to allow, in its transparency, to observe the details of the veins, since that karmic tone gives it a warmth that the blood would hide. Before we talked about two pieces made from a broken rocking chair, and there is a third sculpture, which looks like they are beech wood, very hard and often used in chairs. It is a sculpture whose silhouette forms a human figure and is entitled Ritmotab, abbreviation of "tabalet", which in Valencian means drum, because the figure is a character that walks to the rhythm of the drum that is playing, as shown by that foot suspended in the air, while the head marches up and the hand marks the drum rolls. Once again here the success is in achieving movement, volume and harmony, all with the greatest simplicity, as if it were a sketch made in pencil or pen, freehand and done in an instant. Many of these sculptures would admit the monumental size and translated into other materials could be perfectly in any urban space, even without the color or bare highlight their potential, and passers-by would enjoy contemplating them, instead of bibelots or pieces without concept or character that Frequently we have to endure. Seeing these works, it can be deduced that the artist before dreaming them as existent, because he achieves, something that every sculptor should do but nowadays is not so frequent, the conjunction of diverse and disparate elements giving them a unity so that they turn out to be natural , even if they surprise us. Ritmoarp would be the "rhythm of the harpy", no doubt because of the stained brass letters on his forehead, from which the face is born, here totally flat. Once again, disparate elements achieve the harmony of the whole, like that iron with patina of oxide, with the shape of a lizard, which marks the nose, and uses the tail to mark an eyebrow, which compensates for the composition of the smallest eye. The head is filled with brass crosses, a message that the harpy, being of an evil nature, carries death inside it, and that here being crossed into the head could be interpreted as a criticism of the abusive power exercised by religions. Basset maintains the coherence and continuity in his work, although in a completely different way to the previous exhibitions, which were in iron and aluminum, so in Eccehomo 6 the titles were car brands, something that he manifests here in Ritmoquatre, and the theme of the music was in some guitar figures, and was repeated in the Bassetmetamorfosis exhibition, as in this exhibition with the rocking-guitar or the dulzaineros and tamboriles, where we see that themes and concepts are a constant in his work. The title of this exhibition is perfect, Ritmos, since it is a true reflection of the movement that manages to give to the figures, but it could also have been called totems, because they are powerful figures, and I would say that many of them have relic potential, although this is not true. was in the intention of the sculptor. Joseph Basset achieves the balance between the static and the dynamic, something that in appearance may seem contradictory but is not. The drawings of other Basset exhibitions were in ink, pen and watercolor, here the drawings are based on a photograph, which Joseph has made from crumpling plastic bags or tissue paper, and then cut out the photos and make a collage, according to I suggested the image formed, something like reading in the clouds or the projection of shadows. As the interpretation of this game is subjective, it shapes the figure, outlining the lines with inks, waxes or graphite. Some circumscribe them as in a matrix, which may encompass the whole figure or only part. The tone is predominantly white, in multiple shades, white salt or sake, white linen or lilac, nacre white or narcissus, white opal or spikenard, white pearl or silver, white wax or kaolin, white cotton or acacia flower, poplar bark white, white clay, white rice or amber, white sugar or white coral, white swan or half-melted snow, all tonalities nearby since it only aims to give an aura that helps to dream them. Some figures would say that they have a ghostly halo, other faces are serious or show amazement, there are grimaces of sadness or maybe fear, but none happy or smiling. This goes in consonance with the whites, which are dim, muted but none luminous. It is difficult to point out one in particular, given that everyone goes without a title, but the whole is surprising. It is a very interesting study, which deserves an independent exhibition of the sculptures, because they are so powerful that visitors can go through the drawings without the detail they require. In short, an exhibition where Basset demonstrates his craft, an unusual imagination and his own language, which is what every artist should aspire to. One leaves the contemplation of his works with the assurance of having seen real art, and eagerly wishes his next show. (*) Scardanelli. (Exhibition of Rhythms, by Joseph Basset, Ra del Rey, Espacio de Arte, Madrid, 2013) (*) The poet Encarnación Pisonero signs the texts on plastic arts with the name of Scardanelli. He is a member of AMCA, AECA and AICA.