Date: 1990

Technique: Mixed technique on canvas

Dimensions: 195 x 195 cm

Es Baluard Museu d'Art Contemporani de Palma, Fundació Caixa de Balears collection long-term loan

Reg. no.: 382

Entry date: 2018

Not on display

The pictorial production of Ferran Garcia Sevilla is doubtless one of the exponents of the renovation and consecration of the painting of the 1980s, and his work is a benchmark of the era, in spite of his having been one of the most controversial and “uncomfortable” artists of the post-modern Spanish art system.

In Sama 26 (1990), we are confronted with a work that may be framed within the change his career underwent in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s. The painter, now present on the international circuits, inaugurated an exhibition entitled “Sama” in the Lelong gallery in New York. In it he presented the series of the same name and introduced images of different parts of the body. Hands, feet, or plural arrows - as in the case of this picture from the collection - inundate his colourful canvases. Their entire symbolism can be taken as a free appropriation of the everyday world that surrounds him, creating a dense personal poetry.

Garcia Sevilla’s work denotes dynamism and strength, he himself would admit that he paints “in the heat of the moment”, allowing his creativity to flow without adhering to any pre-established style, but making use of his own glossary of shapes, images and references. With his works, the painter suggests poetic settings by way of fragmented narratives, full of abstract elements or everyday objects, which orbit over the central themes of his oeuvre. Life, death, identity itself, sex or the nature of love are aspects on which Garcia Sevilla reflects, always leaving the interpretation open to the spectator’s connection with the work.

C.J.

Artist biography