Art and arts will be published monthly from now on. I will start this new phase by recommending the extraordinary Pic Adrian exhibition. Paintings from the 60s presented by the Marc Domènech gallery until March 16. It coincided for a few weeks with the Klee exhibition at La Miró and, by relating the works of both artists, it can be concluded that the painting made in Barcelona by the Romanian-born artist and poet Pic Adrian (1910-2008) signifies another way of to be “abstract with memories”, less figurative than Klee’s. A minimalist, geometric, musical, spatial and silent mode. Other notable exhibitions in Barcelona, ??also of abstract painting: Xavier Grau at the Miguel Marcos gallery (until March 14) and Alfons Borrell at Joan Prats (until March 22). And the collective exhibition of ProjecteSD is worth a visit.
The goodbyes. From time to time a phrase from El río y la muerte comes to mind, a wild film that Buñuel directed during his Mexican period. Commenting on certain events, a character said, with a fierce parsimony worthy of Juan Rulfo: “Death has been working hard lately…”. This sunny tale of exaggerated revenge, populated by touchy people who killed each other over trifles, had a tone of black humor. But now there is no room for humor in the face of the blackness of a present day characterized by wars, earthquakes and other deaths. In the cultural field, in recent weeks we have had to say goodbye to people who have been a benchmark in their respective disciplines. I already dedicated an article to Michael Snow, a benchmark of experimental cinema. It has also been and is Carlos Saura for narrative and documentary cinema. The Hunt (1966) is a masterpiece that deserves greater international recognition. No one has better explained the latent or manifest violence of Franco’s Spain, including the causes of violence in any place and at any time. In other films, Saura stood out for his precise use of music: Fatal amour, by Rameau, and a Gnossienne by Satie in Elisa, my life, Jeannette in Cría cuervos, Los Chunguitos in Hurry, hurry. His documentaries on music and dance are a valuable asset. And we must remember other facets: the photographer from Spain in the 50s, the novelist of ¡Esa luz! and the jovial and nice man, well connected with life until the end of it.
I believe that Barcelona and Catalonia would be worse places today if the brain in the shadow –or in the light– of Xavier Rubert de Ventós had not had a beneficial influence on Pasqual Maragall and other political and cultural leaders. Some architecture students mentally or even physically applauded their classes at the university, which opened doors and windows. Rubert de Ventós also meant a triple C policy: educated, Catalan, cosmopolitan. Undoubtedly better than the well-known politics of the quadruple S: sectarian, superficial, bribery, sadistic. Another goodbye for the cartoonist Toni Batllori, capable of summarizing the complex political situation of the already scratched anti-Catalan conflict (anti-Spanish, for others) with a figure and its variations: those colorful and aggressive bastes of the Spanish deck, which symbolized judicial decisions -in expired phase – of the Spanish State against the blind faith of the pro-independence movement and the sovereign hope of the angry Catalan.
Fifth missing: Tom Verlaine, New York bridge between The Velvet Underground and The Strokes, passing through Patti Smith and Talking Heads. I remember the happy face of Francisco Casavella after the memorable concert by Verlaine in the later demolished Salón Cibeles in Barcelona, ??and the enthusiasm of a night-owl lover who in the 1970s and 1980s spread the song Venus to various people. Since then, the music of Tom Verlaine and his group Television hasn’t aged a minute.
Charles Simic. And the sixth is the poet Charles Simic. “It is like the rain in a silent movie, or like a ship at the bottom of the sea, or like a gallery of mirrors at closing time, or like the tomb of the world famous ventriloquist, or like the face of the bride when she sit down to piss after making love all night, or like a shirt drying on the line without a house in sight… Well, you’re getting the idea”.
Serve this fragment as a poetics. It is poetry –this time in prose– according to Simic. It belongs to one of his best books, The Monster Loves His Labyrinth, published by Vaso Roto. Another aphorism from this book: “Where the ideal is conformism, poetry is not welcome.” Simic can be very funny at times: “More tabloid headlines: Shakespeare’s dog ate his best play, never released.” But he is a true poet. For Simic, the poem is “a fragment of time enchanted by the totality of time.” This is true poetry, and better without rhymes.
