Hello! Here I show you some works that captivated me during the visit of ARCO and Urvanity in Madrid.
Days of a lot of rain and cold! But the fairs were full of people, full of paint and pure glimpses in some of the works presented. A thousand thanks to Elena Aitzkoa and Teresa Camacho for their support, it was great!
A beautiful piece by Guillermo Pfaff seen at ARCO at the Ehrhardt Florez Gallery. Talking to Regina Elías, who attended me wonderfully, she told me that this piece is part of a series in which the author inks the canvases and then intervenes them with bleach, creating an auratic effect within the minimalist margins that characterize him. The work gave off a special halo for its radicalism and pragmatism, I loved it. At the bottom of the piece is the signature of the author, which is a fundamental part of his paintings.
It was shocking to be in front of Miriam Cahn’s drawings, present in several stands. Talking to one of the galleries, she reminded me that Miriam spent 25 years drawing only using charcoal black or graphite, before starting with color oil paintings (which are the most popular). There is an underlying tremor in his drawings that pierces the eye. All the ideological load macerated in such a radical way… hurtful and real…
Something similar happened to me with this large-format painting by Maria Prats, at the stand of the Mayoral gallery. In this case, more than an ideological battle, it seemed that the artist was fighting an internal battle, with the memory of her childhood. My heart beat when I knew that the artist had lost her mother at a young age. Somehow that collapsed me. Eduard Mayoral then added that now the artist is in a moment of great stability, also after her recent motherhood.
Miguel Fructoso‘s flash at ARCO! In radicalism, in the oblique gaze. Great to see him in that freshness. I don’t remember the name of the gallery, apologies. I think there was some other piece of him out there, or at least that irreverent spirit was like wandering around the fair.
There were several paintings by Rubén Guerrero at the stand of the Luís Adelantado gallery. There they told me that part of his compositional work arises from the creation of small sculptures, little collages… which he uses as references. I thought it was totally fresh, that although having a strategy it did not fall into formulation and cliché, as I see in Ana Barriga, for example.
There were also several paintings by Eddie Martinez at ARCO and I loved seeing them. They seemed more serious to me than I expected, it’s like I’ve been laughing at Tàpies’ pieces lately, but in front of Martínez’s paintings I felt an uncontrollable attraction. There was something completely genuine, like an engagement that had been born accidentally, like a sudden surrender, something very wild…
