Alberto Reguera (1961) - Oblique light over the port

Oblique light over the port

Alberto Reguera (1961)
Mixed media with oil on canvas — 65 × 82 cm
Port of Barcelona, second half of the 20th / 21st century

Technical sheet

Author: Alberto Reguera (Segovia, 1961)
Chronology: Late 20th century – early 21st century
Oblique Light over the Port
Mixed technique with oil on canvas, featuring characteristic material impastos.
Measurements: 65 × 82 cm
Support: Canvas mounted on original frame.
Style: Materialist Expressionism / Lyric abstraction with a landscape origin
Iconographic location: Port of Barcelona (view of the dock and Montjuïc).
Signature: Signed in the lower left corner.
Condition: Excellent, with stable fillings and well-preserved texture.

2. Compositional and iconographic description

The work presents a port view of the old Port of Barcelona, dominated by a dense and mineral atmosphere that makes the scene more sensory than descriptive.

Three vertical boats float in the foreground, modeled with a bold, sculptural impasto, one of Alberto Reguera's most recognizable hallmarks.

On the horizon, the line of the pier is visible, and ascending, the unmistakable silhouette of Montjuïc, whose presence anchors the landscape to the city. The brushstroke is rough, almost tectonic, creating multiple layers of interpretation: light, matter, and memory converge in a single pictorial gesture. The ochre tones, mineralized greens, and atmospheric grays give the whole a suspended landscape feel, as if the artist was capturing not the visible moment, but its internal resonance.

Reguera constructs space from extreme materiality, making textures function as metaphors: the sea becomes thick, ships emerge as luminous fossils, and the city transforms into a remote, almost archaeological presence.

The artwork invites the viewer to explore it tactilely, creating a dialogue between pictorial and sculptural elements.

3. Style, Context, and Comparisons

The piece is fully integrated into contemporary material expressionism, a path that Reguera has developed with great personality since the 1980s. His work dialogues with references such as Antoni Tàpies in the use of matter as language, with Jean Dubuffet in the pursuit of a poetics of texture, and with abstract landscape artists like Gerhard Richter in the exploration of atmosphere and time.

Reguera is an internationally established artist, with presence in museums such as the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, the Museo Patio Herreriano, and in European and Asian collections.

His interest in landscape as an expanded—more emotional than representational—experience also aligns him with the Spanish tradition of landscape painting by artists like Joaquín Mir or Rusiñol, although reinterpreted from a fully contemporary perspective.

Aesthetic and Comparative Evaluation

We are faced with a work of remarkable strength and character, where Reguera displays his mastery in materializing the pictorial space. The treatment of the Port of Barcelona surpasses a mere visual chronicle to become a mental landscape—intimate, vibrant, and profoundly modern.

The quality of the impasto, stylistic coherence, achieved atmosphere, and maturity of language place this painting in the upper range of the artist's market, fully comparable, in appeal and uniqueness, to the most valued material landscapes of his work.

Exclusive, powerful work with a strong collectible component.