Zacarías González isn’t a reputation that seems in lots of artwork books or catalogues. It is not a reputation that seems on the title tags in lots of public galleries. It does seem hooked up to the identify of a lower than important constructing in Calle Alcaron in Salamanca, the Casa-Museo Zacarías González.
Zacarías González was an artist. He was additionally a trainer. He taught drawing. He was born in 1923 and died in 2003. He lived most of his life in Salamanca, town of his delivery. He spent a while in Madrid, some on nationwide service in Navarra and, in later years, when the Castilian winter was felt extra keenly, he headed south to Alicante. He was a lifelong trainer of drawing and painted in his spare time. He doesn’t appear to have travelled extensively.
Within the Calle Alcaron gallery, a customer can see a lot of the artist’s life’s work, which divides itself throughout three broad durations, the representational, the summary and the re-discovery of a modified realism. Zacarías González is basically unknown in worldwide artwork circles, hardly identified even in Spain and is a reputation that solely aficionados in Salamanca would recognise. So why commit an article to him? The reply is straightforward. It is the standard of the expertise that deserves publicity and wider appreciation.
In his biographical observe within the gallery’s glorious catalogue, Louis Javier Moreno observes that for a lot of twentieth century artists, the life is the artwork. Within the case of Zacarías González, nevertheless, he insists that this ought to be inverted in order that for this artist, the artwork was his life. These are footage which might be intensely private, enigmatic, mental, reflective, self-analytical, self-critical, refined, ascetic. They’re additionally extremely lovely. At no level does this work attempt to shock, attempt for noticeable individuality above communication, use overstatement to momentarily shock. Every part right here merely communicates.
As an artist, Zacarías González appears to have visited a number of twentieth century types in the identical analytical manner that an vacationer may change into acquainted with a brand new place. He appears all the time to have been studying, however his powers of assimilation have been appreciable. He notices stylistic element, contextualizes it inside his personal expertise after which, slightly than copy its dictates, he makes use of this assimilated language to speak a private world in visible kind.
And so right here, in three flooring of this Casa-Museo set in a modest home, we’re offered with recognisable associations of early Picasso, cubism, di Chirico-like surrealism, Tapies-like enigmatic abstraction, classical varieties that may have been painted on the plaster of Pompei, Klee and Rouault and doubtless fairly much more. However these will not be copies. They don’t seem to be imitations. They’re private works that inhabit a stylistic world and use the language of that world to share potential expression and thus, by way of that realized assimilated language, state one thing profoundly private, and thus fairly completely different from the nonetheless identifiable affect.
The gallery’s web site can simply be discovered by enetering the identify and site right into a search engine and lots of the works it homes could also be seen there. Private highlights included Cerrada hasta octubre, Fuga, Fuego fatuo, Charra, La tunecina, El viaje del Dios, Viejo, viejo Mondrian, La suite de Nueva Orleans, and plenty of extra.
One of many joys of touring in Spain is to share the oft-expressed satisfaction in native heroes, be they artists, writers, musicians, architects, or no matter. From the well-known, similar to Dali in Figueres or Chillida in San Sebastian or Sorolla in Madrid (which, in fact, was his residence, not his birthplace) to the much less well-known internationally such because the Galician painters in Ourense and Pontevedra, these of the Almería college, or the Basque artists in Vittoria or Bilbao. Every city in every province appears to precise a quiet, understated satisfaction in native achievement and, crucially, commit sources to have a good time that achievement with all the time understated, however actual satisfaction. There could also be queues of vacationers in Figueres, however one typically wants to hunt out these galleries that show native work. One wants, as an example, to ebook an appointment to go to the Chillida. Additionally right here in Salamanca, there’s an e-mail hyperlink on the Casa-Museo web site that enables a go to to be pre-arranged. One cannot simply flip as much as go to to the Casa-Museo Zacarías González. However don’t be deterred. The appointment is simple to acquire, and the rewards are memorable.
The customer to Salamanca may have the cathedrals, the College, the palaces and the stunningly lovely previous city on the checklist, to not point out the artwork nouveau gallery. However don’t let the obvious impediment of getting to rearrange a go to to this gallery deter you. Any go to to Salamanca by anybody with the slightest curiosity in artwork ought to embody a visit to the Casa-Museo Zacarías González. You’ll not be upset.
