topography of the soul - beatriz crespo

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The catalogue is published in connection with the exhibition “Beatriz Crespo_ Topography of the Soul” at the Teatro Calderón in Valladolid, Spain.

Topography of the Soul29 October - 1 December 2013.Curator: Vincent Chomaz

Project selected by the Fundación Municipal de Cultura of Valladolid, as part of the Program CreArt - Network of Cities for Artistic Creation.

Imperturbablesby Vincent Chomaz / Curator of the exhibition

Gone from Berlin; temporary return to Valladolid – her home town. For Topography of the Soul, Beatriz Crespo came back to her roots and renewed with her teenagehood atelier. There, over the span of a month, she produced a new corpus of drawings and paintings.

Ethereal faces; all human; all male. If the works don’t point to any obvious break in style or subject, they undeniably are an evolution; they possess something different; a new strength or density. Peering through the deceivably appeased features of those men – of her models – there is violence; the clamor of the sentiments and the sensations; the tumult of their souls; the uproar of Beatriz’s own spirit.

There is here, concomitantly, gentleness and furor; languor and beauty; boiling effervescence. Those faces – more gigantic than ever – seem to be domi-nating us; to look at us from afar and above; too far for us, we can be ignored. Their attitude is generous and submissive but, at the same time, defying and full of disdain; as if us, poor mortals, we only were amounting to nothing. She speaks of “Planets”, hanging high in the sky, and I see here “Imperturbables”; men that are dead but alive; loved

ones but rejecting. There is violence but sélénité*; love but aversion; distance. These are men whom she cherishes, loves, adores, a bit, a lot, passionately; men whom she tries to grasp the beauty – the truth.

Beatriz’s paintings are made of stratification; they show a complexity or – more accurately – a duality that can be found in this intense fight of the self that now inhabits and pervades through every portraits. Beatriz Crespo paints in a peculiar way; if she represents faces, figures, she does it in a calligraphic and minimalistic way; her impressionism is abstract, cleaned of any adornments, but extremely expressionist.

When I try to remember one of her paintings, I only manage to summon the image of an all black and white canvas – very contrasted, very graphic – and thus even though – I know it and observe it every time – her paintings are colored; different, so so different from my bi-chromatic remembrances. It is as if, too absorbed by her symbolic language, too impacted by the strength emanating from those faces and brush strokes, I could only be reminded, I could only bring back to life that Manichean relationship; I am torn between him and her.

*Translation note: “sélénité” is an untranslatable made-up word; it consists of the French adjectives “sérénité” (serenity) and“sélénite” (old-fashioned; that relates to the Moon); it refers here to the distance and peacefulness of celestial objects, i.e. “Planets”.

en este páramo árido hijos de un dios imperfectoenterramos nuestras manos

o diálogos de sueños

Topography

Beatriz Crespo transforms the passing of time into an agent of fascination, transposing bodies into narratives. Her style – also described as "soul topography" – translate the subtle variations of light and the slight changes in textures of the skin into cartography; intertwined calligraphic lines and brush strokes.

Addressing the human body from this unusual viewpoint – at the same time abstract but figurative, highly expressionist –, Beatriz Crespo makes us face powerful ethereal works in which man physiognomy is turned into a rugged landscape carved by the passage of time and life. The human is here only a beginning, the base for the creation of a new and wordless symbolic language.

Topography of the Soul is an ode to the male body and the beauty of experience.

Solo Exhibitions (selection)

2013 Topografía del Alma, Teatro Calderón, Valladolid, Spain La memoria del Cuerpo, Berlin, Germany Left Hand Ballade, G&G, Berlin, Germany

2012 Verdandi, Porcelaingres Art Showroom, Berlin, Germany

2011 Esqueixeus, Das Büro fur Innere und Aussere Angelengenheiten, Berlin, Germany

2010 Striche, Luna Sol Gallery, Berlin, Germany

Group Exhibitions (selection)

2013 BERLIN ART WEEK, Sant Georges, Berlin, Germany POGO, Raum fur Freiheit, Berlin, Germany Fieber Festival, ACUD, Berlin, Germany Vértigo, Salon für Kunst, Berlin, Germany Draw, SMK, Berlin, Germany Antropomorphic, EXPO, Berlin, Germany

2012 Gynaeceum, Artment, Berlin, Germany Berliner Esplendour, Stattbad, Berlin, Germany Art Connect Berlin, Art Connect Berlin, Berlin, Germany Bewortete Bilder, CK, Berlin, Germany

2011 Koffer/Suitcase, Forum Factory, Berlin, Germany Nacht und Nebel, BcmArte, Berlin, Germany

2010 Miniworks, Schiller Palais, Berlin, Germany

Beatriz CrespoValladolid 1977

2009 YAQ, Artz21 Gallery, Barcelona, Spain

2000 Jovenes Artistas de CyL, Forum de Maia, Porto, Portugal ARTECAL, Sala de Exposiciones JCL, Spain

1999 ARTECAL, Monasterio del Prado, Valladolid, Spain

1998 ARTECAL, Monasterio del Prado, Valladolid, Spain ARTECAL, Puerta de Toledo, Madrid, Spain

1997 Bienal de Maia, Forum da Maia, Porto, Portugal Bienal de Maia, Monasterio del Prado, Valladolid, Spain

1996 ARTECAL, Palacio de la Alhóndiga, Segovia, Spain ARTECAL, Monasterio del Prado, Valladolid, Spain

Prizes (selection)

2000 ARTECAL / Instalation, Spain1999 ARTECAL / Etching, Spain1998 ARTECAL / Painting, Spain1996 ARTECAL / Painting, Spain

Press (selection)

2013 Kaltblut, November, Germany Europapress, April, Spain 2012 PLAN B, June, Germany Berlin Art Parasites, June, September, Germany BERLINARTLINK, June, Germany TWIN, December, UK

Beatriz Crespowww.beatrizcrespo.com

Vincent Chomazwww.vincentchomaz.com