Guillem Ramos-Poquí

Paintings 2016

Visions of Time, Space, Memory and the Ephemeral

An Introduction

by Antony Austin


Our world is one of signs and symbols. Ramos-Poquí’s  'Visions of Time, Space, Memory and the Ephemeral'  consists of a series of paintings concerned with the dramatic fragmentation of these symbols. 

As in his series of drawings, 'Tangled Lines', the juxtapositions of high art/culture, and mythology, with 'low-brow' popular culture (from Felix the Cat and Pokemon, to film stars from Casablanca and the robotic female character from the 2015 film Ex-Machina), alongside allusions to warfare, the atom, and social issues, pack a powerful and at the same time whimsical punch. Each painting is complex and rich, its composition allowing the viewer to effortlessly enter and absorb the ‘world’ and stories evoked. By means of sketches, iconographical references are made to Goya's 'Caprichos', Titian, Tintoretto, Vermeer, David Teniers, Bosch, De Chirico. Indian miniatures, the Medieval 'Bestiaries', and a relief sculpture of the Creation of Eve from Notre Dame cathedral are also referenced. The way the iconographical elements in these compositions are treated and interrelated is both creative and innovative. In one of them, for instance, a dragonfly appears as an insect which can be read both as a drone and as a prehistoric image.

Images emerge in a space driven by fluid, unexpected asymmetrical compositions, where figures defy both gravity and perspective. Using a variety of techniques such as egg-tempera, encaustic, oil, acrylic, to define areas of colour-form-texture, the artist achieves a vibrant pictorial surface of unified contrasting textures and unexpected harmonies. The outlines of mathematical shapes, angles, circles and mandalas – forming geometrical patterns – provide a refuge amongst the seeming deconstruction of these symbolic forms.

The originality and innovative qualities of these works remind us of what Theodor Adorno said in his 'Aesthetic Theory' about the need to interrelate a challenging 'content' with the use of innovative 'form' - thus the formal and the conceptual must interact, enhancing each other rather than 'cancelling' each other out. To understand reality linguist Ferdinand Saussure provided us with a well known 'semiotic' triangle, classifying signs into: icon, index and symbol. It was Jacques Lacan who found that this conception was open to 'gaps' between these three signs, suggesting that these gaps pointed to a metaphysical reality beyond, which could not be codified.

Ramos-Poquí's paintings point to a new semiotic and hermeneutic metaphysical dimension beyond that of traditional signs and a post-deconstruction analysis. They suggest that we live in a world of flux, a world built on principles which are man-made, arbitrary and temporary, ultimately exposing the reality of how man views the world.

Antony Austin 2016

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Links to other Recent Work:

Drawings 2015 'TangIed Lines' Drawings

Collages 2014 'Mirror Spaces: Reflections on Culture and the Ephemeral' Collages

Exhibition Barcelona 2014 Painting-collages

Guillem Ramos-Poquí: Link to Wikipedia Enclyclopedia

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