"Smoke drawings" by Jaume Faixó at the Richard Vanderaa Gallery

From 19 February, the Richard Vanderaa Gallery in Girona presents the temporary exhibition Dibuixos de Fum by Jaume Faixó. This exhibition shows a series of smoke drawings that Faixó made during 1983 and which were characterized by minimalist geometric abstraction considered the “purest” of the artist's career.

The technique that can be seen in these drawings is the collage of black planes, very well delimited and arranged on the white space. The art critic Arnau Puig explained about this work that “Faixó builds a world of amatute forms only to strike the sensibility and make it vibrate, without resorting to emotions or anxieties, for simple aesthetic commotion. Perhaps this is why he abandoned the initial gesturalism that, instead of highlighting the composition, drew attention to its vital genesis. Faixó wants to be constructivist, but that construction is generated not from geometry but from the life that drives creative activity. Faixó's formalism is the creator of environments that can be perfectly translated into architectural spaces that drive new conditionings for action ”.

For his part, Faixó commented in 1974 on this series that “in these first drawings to achieve total white I had to resort to collage. Then I discovered that satin paper allows for more direct work. It's like sculpting the mass of black until you get the figure out ”. Later, in 1986, Faixó explained that although he had been using the same technique since the 1970s, he had changed his ways and had been working in black and white since 1978. From here, things get trickier, and this is where the true meaning of life lies.

In 1991, Faixó stated that "I believe that the maximum that an artist can achieve is to transfer his mood and feelings to his work and make it reach other people through the work".

This exhibition can be visited at the Richard Vanderaa Gallery in Girona until March 26, 2022, from Tuesday to Friday from 5:00 pm to 8:00 pm and on Saturdays from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm and from 5:00 pm at 8 p.m.