Manuel Pinazo (1956) - Esperanza I

GEOMETRY AND COLOR IN SPACE

Painted with natural pigments on mansonite (wood)
Year - 2021
Dimensions 70.5 x 91 cm. Shipped with the artist's certificate

THE EXPANDED GEOMETRY
By Pedro Alberto Cruz

The abstract language in which Manuel Pinazo Rodríguez's entire body of work unfolds is a direct consequence of the reinvention that geometric rigor underwent during postmodernity, as well as of the expansion that painting is carrying out beyond its traditional boundaries. The first distinctive element of his painting is the introduction of error, of 'imperfection' in the translation of certain geometric schemes with a long tradition dating from the vanguards. Pinazo's work repeats compositional models based on parallel vertical or horizontal bands of different colors, checkered patterns, or the repetition of geometric figures such as the rectangle. When you observe, in detail, each of these compositions, you notice how the cold rationalism on which geometric abstraction is based has been subverted by the insertion of different irregularities: lines slightly inclined and therefore not fully straight; different spacing between the various color bands; verticals that are interrupted and break the rhythm of the work; or, evidently, the cheerful color—echoing Matisse—often with an air of naïveté, which undermines that metaphysical authority that oozes from much of Vanguard geometric abstraction.

But the process of deconstructing abstract geometry that Manuel Pinazo carries out does not stop at this first level of critique. There is, moreover, a “second level,” which the artist has been consolidating over the years and which yields interesting conclusions. First, and in a line of work that continues the post-painterly abstraction of the 80s, the author plays with the sculptural potential of painting by bringing together several pieces that dynamize the traditional idea of a square or rectangular contour/frame.

Manuel Pinazo, 1956 Valencia
• Arts and Trades. Eduardo Merello School (A.H.V.) affiliated to the School of Arts and Trades of Valencia (5 years)