Aspects of Red

10.08.–14.09.2019

The exhibition "Aspects of Red" brings together works by various artists where red is the predominant color. It is not a random decision as Red has been a banner and distinctive mark of the Horizon Gallery for a long time. 

We don’t know where the colors we remember are in our memory, why artists choose them as if they were emblems of their work. Colors are under the layers of memories that have been forgotten by reason; they belong to myths and symbols. We do not know the root nor the origins. However, the black face of Osiris with golden eyelids and eyebrows comes to our collective memory as does the enameled golden ball with blue rings that Zeus played with as a child, or Geriphanes’ heavy red oxen that were of wonderful beauty.

In pre-Columbian culture, carmine was a pigment taken from the “cochineal”, an insect that Aztecs and Mayans in the region of Oaxaca used to get a characteristic dye.  The Maya used cinnabar that impregnated the space of the grave and the body of the deceased with red, as found in the so-called red queen of the jungle of Palenque in Chiapas. We have seen the symbolic force of color used a lot throughout the history of art.  More recently it has been the dominant color in some sacrificial works of Hermann Nitsch or in the poetic forms of Anish Kapoor.

Anthropologists and linguists have realized that the first terms cultures have developed with respect to colors distinguish firstly between light and dark, perhaps between black and white. When they have evolved to include words that describe colors they almost always refer to the color red and the rest come later. Does red always become a huge therapeutic and symbolic force that transforms consciousness?

The exhibition Aspects of Red at Horizon Gallery has collected the works of Jaume Amigó, Xavier Escribá, Sabine Friesicke, Gabriel, Steve Silver, Lluís Lleó, María Paola Coda, Ralph Bernabei, Silvia Lerin, Rafa Forteza exploring the power and strength of the color red n all its nuances.

The placement of these works in the white space of the gallery is a great challenge. Something similar to the moment when Japanese calligraphers put their stamps, their "Hanko" impregnated in cinnabar red on paper. The act of placing the seal is a privileged act that gives the definitive meaning to a work by making space speak and creating proportion between filling and void.


Inauguración Sabado 10 de Julio a les 19:30 horas

 

Jaume Amigó
Nuage _2019
Acrylic on canvas
114 x 195 cm
Xavier Escribà
Colour is lust ( Rouge)_2018-19
Acrylic on canvas and steel
116 x 116 x 17 cm
Silvia Lerin
Residual 2_2012
Mixed technique , collage on paper
29 x 39 cm
Ralph Bernabei
Red lines _2019                        
Caran D’ache crayon on paper / wood
50 x 150 cm
Steve Silver
Primary School 120_2019
Acrylic on MDF
19 cm x 64 cm  x 19 cm