PAINTING

How can it be that Giorgio Griffa has not yet exhibited in Spain? The Rafael Pérez Hernando Gallery exhibits a selection of his historical works from the 1970’s, together with a more recent collection of his watercolours. “Italy was a great influence on a number of Spanish painters who in turn went their own unique ways.” "The Mediterranean Sea, the merging of the colours and signs of Manuel Hernandez Mompó, the almost infinite rhythms of Giorgio Griffa, and then, of course, the furrows of Joan Hernández Pijuán.” The catalogue's post-scriptum that was published in Spanish for the first time in 2005 opened with these words written by Giorgio Griffa, describing the theoretic/philosophic basis of his work. This artist, philosopher, mystic sage was born in Turin in 1936, a tragic year in Spanish history. The Italian movement Pittura-Pittura, which began in the late 1960’s, was vigourously defended by its followers. A group of artists insisted that painting as an art-form was not dead, in spite of the advances of new media and technology, because the thousands of years of he history of painting simply cannot be forgotten. “Art needs painting as an art-form, because it uses its language, which is that of light and dark, reason and emotion, air and wind, all at the same time.” (G. Griffa). *** “I am a tradicional painter”; has been a phrase repeatedly used by Griffa over the past thirty years. This man with will fill a page of the history of Italian conceptual abstract painting, even mystic painting, with his wisdom.