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Lot Essay
"The light in the desert is so intense that things disappear and the shadows are more intense than the things themselves. [...] In Africa, light isn't colour. Light is much stronger than colour. Colour is almost corroded by the light." (M. Barceló, quoted in Miquel Barceló, Obra sobre papel 1979-1999, exh. cat, Madrid, 1999, p. IV)
Familiarly know as the "white paintings" the group of works painted from 1989 to the beginning of 1990 were inspired by the African landscape, its flora, its fauna and most importantly the effects of water and the lack of it.
Barceló made his first visit to Africa in 1988. This was to be a very long first trip, lasting eight months during which he crossed the Sahara from Algeria to Gao, in Mali, where he stayed to work.
The Sahara had had a deep impart on Barceló. The 'white paintings' were filled with the dazzling light of the desert. Constelació no. 6, with its bustling composition, evokes the heat and dust of the Sahara, blinding the viewer with both brightness and detail. As Barceló himself has said, "At a temperature of 50°C and with the sandwind one sees everything much clearer, that is to say, one ceases to see anything at all' (M. Barceló, 1988, quoted in Miquel Barceló 1987 1997, exh.cat., Barcelona, 1998, p.86).
Familiarly know as the "white paintings" the group of works painted from 1989 to the beginning of 1990 were inspired by the African landscape, its flora, its fauna and most importantly the effects of water and the lack of it.
Barceló made his first visit to Africa in 1988. This was to be a very long first trip, lasting eight months during which he crossed the Sahara from Algeria to Gao, in Mali, where he stayed to work.
The Sahara had had a deep impart on Barceló. The 'white paintings' were filled with the dazzling light of the desert. Constelació no. 6, with its bustling composition, evokes the heat and dust of the Sahara, blinding the viewer with both brightness and detail. As Barceló himself has said, "At a temperature of 50°C and with the sandwind one sees everything much clearer, that is to say, one ceases to see anything at all' (M. Barceló, 1988, quoted in Miquel Barceló 1987 1997, exh.cat., Barcelona, 1998, p.86).