Antoni Tàpies

ANTONI TÀPIES PUIG (Barcelona, 1923 - 2012).
"Senyors IV", 1998.
Gouache on Japan paper.
Signed in the lower right corner.
Provenance: -Gallery Toni Tàpies, Barcelona. -Private collection, Paris.
Exhibitions: "Antoni Tàpies. Abstract on paper" (July 1998), at the Centro Cultural Palacio de la Audiencia, Soria.
Measurements: 32,5 x 49 cm.

"Senyors IV" synthesizes Tàpies' ability to turn words, signs and gestures into vehicles of existential reflection. The work oscillates between the physical act of writing/painting and the symbolic charge of each stroke, unfolding a territory where the spiritual, the human and the material intertwine with the intensity and sobriety that characterize his production on paper in the nineties.

On a clear background emerge various graphic elements that structure the composition. The word "Senyor" stands out in the foreground, written in bright red, whose gestural character gives it presence and urgency. This inscription also appears twice in black, creating a play of reiterations and resonances that accentuates the semantic dimension of the term. In Tàpies' poetics, words do not function as mere linguistic references: they act as symbols charged with cultural memory, spiritual ambiguity and tension between the sacred and the everyday. "Senyor" probably alludes to a questioning of power and hierarchy.

Next to these words appears a cross in the form of an "X", executed in black, a recurring sign in Tapian iconography. This cross is a polyvalent element: it can signify denial, signaling, warning or even presence; an emblem that functions simultaneously as a mark and as an erasure.

The vertical lines in black and red, very subtle and rhythmically alternating, introduce an almost musical cadence into the work. Their delicacy contrasts with the power of the verbal gesture, providing structure, verticality and a sense of meditative repetition. Finally, a red erasure at the bottom adds a layer of spontaneity and rupture, a gesture of energy that interrupts the orderly arrangement of the signs and recalls the visceral and material dimension of the pictorial act.

Antoni Tàpies begins in art during his long convalescence from a lung disease. He progressively devoted himself more intensely to drawing and painting, and finally gave up his law studies to devote himself entirely to art. Co-founder of "Dau al Set" in 1948, he began to exhibit in the Salones de Octubre in Barcelona, as well as in the Salón de los Once held in Madrid in 1949. After his first individual exhibition in the Layetanas Galleries, he travels to Paris in 1950, with a scholarship from the French Institute. In these years he began his participation in the Venice Biennial, exhibited again at the Layetanas and, after a show in Chicago, in 1953 he had a solo exhibition at Martha Jackson's New York gallery. From then on, his exhibitions, both group and solo, were held all over the world, in leading galleries and museums such as the Guggenheim in New York and the Museum of Modern Art in Paris. Since the seventies, anthologies have been dedicated to him in Tokyo (1976), New York (1977 and 2005), Rome (1980), Amsterdam (1980), Madrid (1980), Venice (1982), Milan (1985), Vienna (1986) and Brussels (1986). Self-taught, Tàpies has created his own style within the avant-garde art of the 20th century, in which tradition and innovation are combined within an abstract style but full of symbolism, giving great relevance to the material substrate of the work. It is worth mentioning the marked spiritual sense given by the artist to his work, where the material support transcends its state to signify a profound analysis of the human condition. Tàpies' work has been highly valued internationally, being exhibited in the most prestigious museums in the world. Throughout his career he has received numerous awards and distinctions, including the Praemium Imperiale of Japan, the National Culture Award, the Grand Prize for Painting in France, the Wolf Foundation of the Arts (1981), the Gold Medal of the Generalitat de Catalunya (1983), the Prince of Asturias Award for the Arts (1990), the Picasso Medal of Unesco (1993) and the Velázquez Award for Plastic Arts (2003). A great defender of Catalan culture, of which he is deeply imbued, Tàpies is a great admirer of the mystical writer Ramón Llull, as well as the Catalan Romanesque and Gaudí's architecture. At the same time, he appreciates Eastern art and philosophy, which, like his own work, blur the boundary between matter and spirit, between man and nature. Influenced by Buddhism, he shows in his paintings how pain, both physical and spiritual, is inherent to life. Antoni Tàpies is represented in major museums around the world, such as the foundation that bears his name in Barcelona, the Reina Sofía in Madrid, the Guggenheim in Berlin, Bilbao and New York, the Fukoka Art Museum in Japan, the MoMA in New York and the Tate Gallery in London.