Sean Scully

"Mérida" series

Date: 2001

Technique: C-print

Dimensions: 50 x 61 cm each. Set of 16 photographs

Edition: 1/8

Es Baluard Museu d'Art Contemporani de Palma

Reg. no.: 377

Not on display

The “Mérida” series comes closer to the other artistic facet of Irish painter Sean Scully, that of a photographer. As a result, in this case he shows a series developed since a trip to Sienna he made in 1978, and different countries have been captured through the artist’s shutter ever since, including Morocco, Scotland or Spain. The “Merida” series was created on a journey to Mexico, and is comprised of sixteen smallformat colour images. The outside of the buildings is photographed from the front and with a selective gaze, reducing the composition to the façade of the houses.

On his travels Scully selects outlying districts away from tourists, as in the “Merida” series; here he finds a wealth of textures in the imperfections of the streets and houses, nuances of colour that has been washed-out and altered by time which produces colour ranges of great visual force. These compositions have no human presence, the doors and windows become flat surfaces, reminding one of his painting, where colour is characteristic of his compositions rooted in geometric
abstraction.

E.B.

Artist biography