....Bernardo Torrens
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THE HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE OF SPANISH REALISM
by Lloyd Nick, Director of Oglethorpe University Museum
This exhibition of contemporary Spanish realists may surprise the eyes jarred in our century by abstract and fanciful art. Historical perspective, however, proves that these artists come out of the true Spanish tradition in art.
Spanish painters have always shown a marked ability to bring realism and vitality to the traditional religious themes. In no other place have spiritual ideas been given such earthy forms as in Spain. Beginning as early as the 12th-century, painters created lifelike representations of human faces. Often, the features of their religious images came from the actual life around them.
During El Greco's time, the Counter-Reformation flourished under the lnquisition. At the time, the fervor of the Spanish Catholics was almost ecstatic. In the painting, Burial of Count Orgaz, El Greco's portrayal of the count's death is that of a miracle. El Greco combined mysticism with portraiture. He not only had painted himself and his son as witnesses of Orgaz's ceremonial burial, but he also included portraits of the people from the streets of his adopted Toledo in his other religious paintings.
The 16th-century was the Golden Age in Spain's culture. Along with Cervantes, Lope de Vega and Calderón, a genuine Spanish realism emerged in the 17th-century painting of Ribera, Zurbarán and Velázquez. These were hard-working artists notable for their faithful and exact observation and their skill to translate it into paint.
Zurbarán, the Spanish Caravaggio, was the early master of the still life. Simplicity and poetry are seen in his representation of utensils of everyday life. These objects glow with quiet mysticism. He painted with the meticulous care typical of the art of the Netherlands which influenced his work.
Velázquez, the summit of 17th-century Baroque painting, developed objective portraiture with no trace of flattery or idealism. This tradition in portraiture was to be continued by Goya who, like Velázquez, also interpreted truthfully the likeness of the royal family. Oddly, both artists were not blessed with beautiful or attractive sitters; both the Spanish Habsburgs and the Bourbons were inarguably considered to be phisically unattractive.
Velázquez's pictorial realism portrayed the truth of the moment as accurately as a snapshot. Members of the royal family were posed like the stiff clients of the early photographers two centuries later. However, Velázquez's real interest was in painting the ordinary man, the peasant.
His efforts to achieve an intense realistic picture of the everyday world around him were of an extremely high Ievel.
Another major theme in Spanish figure painting is that of the secular female nude. It begins with Velázquez over a century and a half before Goya's Naked Maja. Nudity, until Velázquez, was relegated only for the depiction of the dead souls in religious paintings. Rejecting this prescribed limitation and accepting the influence of the highly sensual and secular Venetians, Velázquez created a love godess that seemed to be reincarnated from antiquity rather than from the anonymous, sinned souls of Christianity. His Venuses are appropriate illustrations.
The realism from contemporary Spain in this exhibition continues the high level of mastership and the traditional themes of old Spain. It is sincere in its lack of 20th-century superficiality and gimmicks. Like their well-known predecessors, the represented artists have a strong foundation in drawing, especially in drawing the figure. Two of them, Valls and Torrens actually began their educational training not in art but in medicine- thus thoroughly understanding the physical potential, the structure, and the limitations of the human body. Valls does not use a model for his alchemical creations, while Torrens utilizes the modern technique of super-realism, the airbrush. Like El Greco, Isoe brings in the sensivity of another culture and its innate aesthetic; the result is powerful analytically conceived images. Roa transforms the everyday around him into the magical, yet earthy tradition of Zurbarán and Velázquez.
Reality for the Spanish masters has always exposed the shadows in life. Unlike the celluloid world of Hollywood, there never is a totally happy ending, because they study and live life with spiritual intensity and devotion to truth.
Their artwork pulsates with life in its full spectrum- it is rich in color and texture, palpable to the senses and highly energizing. As we study the paintings and drawings in this exhibition, Four from Madrid: Contemporary Spanish Realism, we see superior draughtsmanship and the passionate involvement of the Spanish soul. We may also be witnessing the beginning of a Renaissance, Spain's next Golden Age.
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