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Lot Essay
‘My love of the unknown, my desire of these infinite holes of mystery’ – Manolo Millares
Inky rivers of paint teem down the sewn and scored façade of Manolo Millares’ Muro (Wall). Colour blocks and burlap folds form an evocative and visceral palimpsest, and like a wound sewn back together, Muro offers a duelling vision of destruction and salvation. Millares’ fascination with remnants and ruins dates to his childhood visits to the Canarian Museum in Las Palmas, Canary Islands. There, he discovered the mummified remains of the island’s native Guanches, whose population was decimated by colonial conquest; recalling this profoundly affecting encounter, Millares said, ‘I discovered what man is and, above all, the “finitude” of man. I realised that what I saw – the extermination of a race – had been an injustice. That was the original starting-point for my sackcloths’ (M. Millares, quoted in J-A. França, Millares, Barcelona 1978, p. 94). This memory, along with the torn burlap creations of Alberto Burri which Millares discovered after he moved to Madrid in 1955, proved profoundly influential for his practice. Created in 1956, Muro is one of the artist’s first paintings to feature the gouged burlap that would become his signature material. Frequently discussed in relation to Arte Povera and Art Informel, Millares’ aesthetic choices instead were fundamentally tied to the dark periods of recent history, notably World War II, Hiroshima and the Spanish Civil War. In an age marked by trauma, he sought to represent the human condition, offering redemption through his curative patchworks. In Muro, light streams through the canvas, a restorative, textured quilt that refuses to be extinguished.
Inky rivers of paint teem down the sewn and scored façade of Manolo Millares’ Muro (Wall). Colour blocks and burlap folds form an evocative and visceral palimpsest, and like a wound sewn back together, Muro offers a duelling vision of destruction and salvation. Millares’ fascination with remnants and ruins dates to his childhood visits to the Canarian Museum in Las Palmas, Canary Islands. There, he discovered the mummified remains of the island’s native Guanches, whose population was decimated by colonial conquest; recalling this profoundly affecting encounter, Millares said, ‘I discovered what man is and, above all, the “finitude” of man. I realised that what I saw – the extermination of a race – had been an injustice. That was the original starting-point for my sackcloths’ (M. Millares, quoted in J-A. França, Millares, Barcelona 1978, p. 94). This memory, along with the torn burlap creations of Alberto Burri which Millares discovered after he moved to Madrid in 1955, proved profoundly influential for his practice. Created in 1956, Muro is one of the artist’s first paintings to feature the gouged burlap that would become his signature material. Frequently discussed in relation to Arte Povera and Art Informel, Millares’ aesthetic choices instead were fundamentally tied to the dark periods of recent history, notably World War II, Hiroshima and the Spanish Civil War. In an age marked by trauma, he sought to represent the human condition, offering redemption through his curative patchworks. In Muro, light streams through the canvas, a restorative, textured quilt that refuses to be extinguished.