Essay
José Bellver: Black Paintings
by Fred Sigman
Hung on the white walls of the gallery, José Bellver's Black Paintings speak in whispers
rather than shouts. Even after a hundred years of abstract art among us, though, these paintings
still perplex some viewers - as they should. They do not easily give up their meaning or reveal
their content.
For the artist, this is his intention. The Black Paintings, according to Bellver, were "born
from a clean mind" in the early 1980s. Reflecting on, even dreaming of blackness, Bellver
wanted to produce a body of work which could be "free from the narrative of images." That is,
without apparent meaning. And this is what is different about this work compared to what he has
become known for: these paintings tell no story.
Bellver explains that the paintings are about memory, "going back and bringing forward"
something which has remained buried for nearly twenty years. The most interesting images, says
the artist, are the ones which we carry within our mind, laying dormant but ever-present.
Perhaps, our mental images will never see the light of day, so to speak - they remain our private
meditations. For Bellver, that day came last winter when he decided to produce these works
specifically for this exhibition.
The principal material used in these works is tar - that black, resinous fluid which is
obtained by the destructive distillation of wood or coal. It is the same material used by Chinese
artists to produce the ink sticks which are transformed by water to produce black landscapes on
white paper or silk. For the Chinese painter, it was through the use of ink that the "hidden ideas
in the mind" were brought forth; while "each brushstroke should be a living idea." (from the 17th
century Mustard Seed Garden Manual of Painting). It is in this manner, also, that Bellver uses
tar.
The calligraphic stroke, so characteristic of Chinese landscape paintings, and evident in
Bellver's Black Paintings, can be seen also in the work of Van Gogh, such as his black crows in
Wheatfield with Crows. It is, in fact, with Van Gogh's final painting that Bellver compares his
own "direction of strokes" in these works. The energy which pushed Van Gogh's hand across the
surface of the canvas, says Bellver, motivates him as well.
As Bellver compares his paintings to Van Gogh, it is tempting for us to do likewise with
other artists, especially those who made use of black. There are the Suprematist Black Paintings
(1915) of Malevich, who related his work to the Yoga Stra, seeking through his art, an intuition
with "the infinite ocean of knowledge and power that lies behind mankind." It is the realm of
imagination that Kandinsky also pointed to in his 1913 painting Black Lines. And, of course,
there are the Black Paintings (1950s) of Ad Reinhardt, who likened his use of black as a call to
prayer in a time of fading light.
The Black Paintings by Bellver have the same quality that was appreciated by the Zen
Tea Master when examining a ceramic tea bowl. Reflecting the aesthetic attributes known in
Japanese as sabi and wabi, both paintings and pottery have the beauty of things imperfect; the
beauty of things unconventional. And, like the other aesthetic quality known as yugen, both bring
about in the viewer the sudden perception of something mysterious and strange - an unknown
never to be discovered.
What ties Bellver's paintings to the Asian arts of painting and tea bowls, and to the
modern artists mentioned above is the recognition that art can serve a function which restores to
us a consciousness of reality - a reminder of the here and now. The Black Paintings are not only
meditative for the viewer but are also the result of one man's meditations.
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