Joan Mateu "Mateu" at the El Claustre Gallery

From April 29th to May 14th you can visit the new temporary exhibition at the El Claustre Gallery in Girona by the Salta painter Joan Mateu entitled Mateu. In this new series of paintings, Joan Mateu paints landscapes of the Costa Brava with solitary characters whose faces can only be seen from behind.

According to Miquel Berga, Dean of Humanity, Pompeu Fabra University, Mateu creates the light and compositional atmosphere necessary for the spectator to give shape, and above all “history”, to the anonymous character. It is this peculiar poetics of silence that gives an unmistakable quality to the artist's work "and points out that" the loneliness or melancholy that preside over these paintings paradoxically project consoling effects, a certain cosmic compassion that comes directly, of the compositional serenity and of the special “vibration” of light that permeates all the works of the artist ”.

Some of the outstanding paintings in this exhibition are The Amphitheater of 54 x 89 cm, Reef of 81 x 97 cm, The Blue of 114 x 146 cm, Carpet of 73 x 116 cm or Slit of 89 x 116 cm.

Joan Mateu i Bagaria was born in Salt in March 1976. She is a Catalan multidisciplinary artist with an international profile, specializing in figurative painting and urban spaces. In 1999 he moved to Barcelona, where he studied Applied Arts at the Escola de la Llotja; although he had always worked in watercolor, acrylic painting became his new means of expression. In 2002 he had his first solo exhibition with great success, and from that moment he started his artistic career and began to exhibit regularly in different galleries in both Europe and the United States, winning several awards.

Visiting hours at the exhibition are from Tuesday to Saturday from 10 am to 1.30 pm (mornings) and from 4.30 pm to 8.30 pm. It is closed on Mondays and public holidays.