Page 74 - Ruth Morán

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us that painting has always been able to handle and create lines without boundaries, like Pollock´s16 drip paintings, once interpreted as nightmares fixed in space. Making a simple and trite comparison, we could comment on the difference between Pollock´s drips, seen as a manifestation of energy that must be controlled17, and Ruth Morán´s way of using lines, blotches, and color, which goes beyond a simple diagram. It’s like going from a chaos- embryo to a mega-doodle, to pulsating rhythms. One of the most surprising characteristics of her work is its melody and differentiation, an original iteration which seems to come from gestures and from life which is unaware of itself, like in a daydream. On the other hand, these paintings hold a particular temporal density; the rhythm within each one of them makes us think of the way in which we deal with chaos or untidiness on a daily basis18. Francisco Carpio has stated clearly that Ruth Morán’s polyptic paintings are like a painted diary19. This way of painting, which has more to do with “neurons” than with nerves, leaves behind figurative fantasy and delivers a compulsive fabric that conveys a paradoxical feeling, it seems to be a process
16. “[...] the importance of one of Pollock’s lines. What is it? It can only de defined this way: it’s a line which switches direction at each moment and does not mark any bounda- ries” (Gilles Deleuze: Pintura. El concepto de diagrama, Ed. Cactus, Buenos Aires, 2007, p. 109).
17. “Drips in general are a form of incontinence, a sign indi- cating that control has been betrayed by the whims of flow [...]. The drips explained that painting has an expressive life of its own, it's not just a passive paste that goes where the artist wants it to, but it has a flowing energy which the artist tries to control” (Arthur C. Danto: “Pollock y el drip” in La Madonna del futuro. Ensayos en un mundo del arte plural, Ed. Paidós, Barcelona, 2003, p. 391).
18. “[...] graphic subtlety and personal gesture hide under- neath a solid character structure which at first seems incom- prehensible. Nevertheless, that inscrutability is an illusion, a perceptive spectator can figure out the intense complexity of these pieces which radiate an organized chaos” (José Luis Molina González: “Redes del alma” in Ruth Morán. Tejido Horizonte, Junta de Extremadura, Consejería de Cultura, Mérida, 2006).
19. “Dyptics, polyptics that offer themselves to us as different voices of a single melody, like the parts of a kaleidoscope, or like the different facets of light and color in the eyes of a rare insect” (Francisco Carpio: “Una recóndita fuente” in Ruth Morán. Tejido Horizonte, Junta de Extremadura, Consejería de Cultura, 2006).
which is instantaneous as well as timeless20. We feel captivated, almost hypnotized by the painting’s delicate surface, and we long to touch it.Ruth Morán’s passionate, lyrical tracks, which were called “expressive cardiograms” by Juan Fernández Lacomba21, have been placed rhythmically. Painting makes a statement about the things we see around us, which are constantly appearing and disappearing. John Berger wrote: “It’s possible that the impulse to paint occurs precisely because things tend to disappear; if they didn’t disappear, what’s visible would possess the certainty (permanence) that painting seeks to achieve. More directly than any other art form, painting makes a statement about what exists, about the physical world in which humanity finds itself”22.What painting does, or better yet, what painting aims to do, is to turn something that’s missing into something figurative; in other words, one of the most decisive moments in an artist’s research is defining boundaries. Ruth Morán’s pieces evoke landscapes23 while at the same time making visible the process and experience of boundaries. They are certainly “gestures which lie somewhere between being a testimony of existence and an invitation to
20. “In this continuous and complete present time, which could create and re-create itself indefinitely, this is what one experiences as instantaneousness: if one could be infinitely sharper, a single brief instant would suffice to see the entire piece, to experience the work of art in all its deep meaning and its totality, and to be convinced by it forever” (Michael Freid: “Arte y objetualidad” in Minimal Art, Koldo Mitxele- na, San Sebastián, 1996, p. 81).
21. “It's more like tracks or footprints, always taken by the hand of the artist's pictorial pulse. Spatial joints and laten- cies, metaphorical notes, level lines, impossible surfaces and expressive cardiograms” (Juan Fernández Lacomba: “Ruth Morán: de la expresión a la superficie” in Ruth Morán. Teji- do Horizonte, Junta de Extremadura, Consejería de Cultura, Mérida, 2006).
22. John Berger: Algunos pasos hacia una teoría de lo visible, Ed. Ardora, Madrid, 1997, p. 39.
23. “Painting –Ruth Morán points out- is a vehicle that re- veals clues about the landscape, while also leading to greater knowledge and self-exploration. Landscape is essential in my painting, I owe a lot to landscape. I borrow elements which build this landscape in a code that has to do with my own reality. Besides, landscape speaks to us, it communicates energy that feeds us. Landscape is not just content, it's also structure” (quoted by Francisco Carpio: “Una recóndita fuente” in Ruth Morán. Tejido Horizonte, Junta de Extrema- dura, Consejería de Cultura, Mérida, 2006).
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