MOMPÓ – SAURA
From the black
January 12-march 4, 2023
TEXT OF PRESENTATION
The black is the protagonist of this exhibition. As a symbol of a time or as a metaphor for a state of mind. Black as a (non) color, as the beginning and/or end of a painting. The essentiality and the drama and melt and culminate in the black. As the works of the artists from the exhibition now presents the gallery Fernández-Braso: Manuel H. Mompó (Valencia, 1927) and Antonio Saura (Huesca, 1930). Two artists who shared a life time and they agreed or not in the territory and in their circumstances. Two artists who extended their character and personality of their work as it extends the black on the white background. Two painters in the wire between the figurative and the abstract, and slightly chamfered towards the tragicomedy. A work −of Mompó− treated, narrative, extroverted, cheerful and chattering. A painting −the Saura− baroque, dark, vibrant and stunning.
It is novel that the selection of the works of Mompó are made basically with black color. And it is because it is an artist who traditionally identify with the color and the light and because you can never have put the focus in that kind of works that the artist made especially between the early 60's until the mid 70's. The choice of Saura as a counterpoint is that his work and his figure represent to the contrary. The contrast arises not only from the black-and-white paintings. Arises also between the artists and the works.
The analysis and the reading of the works of this exhibition that we do in this time should not be linked exclusively to their historical and political. These paintings today or are disabled or are harmless. It happens that, in addition, its plastic dimension and its capacity to overwhelm the viewer raise these paintings above the level of the era and of the connotations, in which they were created.