PAINTINGS BY ARTURO ESPINOSA ROSIQUE

I think there is only one art and that art is to try to know each other. The painting serves that art to the extent that it deepens its own personality and style.

For me the painting is an unknown, I never know how it will come out, I do not make any previous approach, just a brief sketch, then I look at the palette, I look at the colors until there comes a time when one of them stands out and I start with it. The important thing is the color, it is the soul of the painting, its expression. It’s like meditating, you never know how to do it until the answer appears in the same silence.

ARTURO ESPINOSA ROSIQUE is a painter from Barcelona, 1952. Architecture studies in ESAB and painting in Llotja.

Exhibitions: • 1988: Exhibition at the Cau d’art Gallery in Sabadell. • 1990: Art and Still Barcelona. • 1991: Spanish Week Exhibition in Poitiers, France. • 1992: MAP Gallery, Barcelona. • 1993: Sala d'Art Putxet, Barcelona. • 1994: Import Selecció Gallery, Girona. Exhibition dedicated to Bullfighting organized by the municipality of L’Hospitalet, Gir Art Calafell. • 1995: Exhibition in Pedreguet Art Amer (Girona). Exhibition at Pedreguet Art Lavaur France. Zúccaro Gallery Exhibition, Madrid. Ranked in 1993, 1994 and 1995 in the Vila de Palamós contest. • 1996 and 1997: Exhibition in Galleries Art Box, Barcelona. American prints art supermarket 1995, / 96/97/98 Exhibitions in galleries of El Corte Inglés until this year. Group exhibitions: • Exhibition at the Cau d’art Gallery in Sabadell. • Augusta, MAP, Kreisler, Art and Satill Galleries, Caja Madrid, Sala d'Artier, Barcelona. • Prisma Vilanova Gallery. • Blaudemar Gallery. • Arenys de Mar. • Agora 3, Sitges. • Gir Art Calafell. • Import Selecció and Claustre Galleries, Girona. • Zúccaro Galleries, El Greco, Castelló 120, Madrid. • Agora 4 Gallery, Castellón. Laura Marquéz Gallery Madrid • Itinerant in Japan to benefit Kobe earthquake victims, etc …

If you had a quote, proverb or a mantra printed on your shirt or tattooed on your skin, what would it say?

I am me.

What is the best thing about being an artist?

Not to be subjected to hierarchies.

What were you interested in when you were a child and how did that lead you down the path to where you are now?

As a child I was very introspective, deep and lonely, I think I’m still the same.

Please tell us about the painting featured in your 1st image:

This is a very recent work, a play of colors of a place that I have always liked to walk around. All Barcelona is full of trees and bananas. I like the shade they produce and the color of the leaves in the fall. That reflective feeling under the shade of the trees is what I have tried to reproduce.

What influenced you for this particular painting?

It always influences the mental tessitura and the research line that is being followed in recent days. It is very interesting to reproduce the automatism that occurs between the hand and the thought as far as possible

How long was the process from the idea to the finished painting?

Actually I cannot say that there was a process, the process in any case is affirmed as it advances in the demands of the canvas itself.

What are some of the functional aspects and the rational thinking behind the decisions like the size, colors, materials, techniques and mediums?

I work on several sizes but they are always small measures. I like to start the painting and finish it in the same session. I paint very fast, I would wear out working a painting in several sessions. As for the colors, I always work with the same palette, sometimes some colors have dominance and others, depending on the subject, although the greens spoil me.

Apart from the piece featured above, are you working on anything else exciting that you can talk about currently?

Everything I do excites me, because everything is a challenge, I never know what will come out, but I know that it will be welcomed.

What are your favorite tools, or equipment that you use to create your work, please be specific!

I always work with a spatula, I would say it’s a vice, it allows me to clean quickly.

What are your favorite ways or places to find inspiration or unwind after a stressful day?

Sit down, close my eyes and think of nothing, notice the energies that flow through my head. I also like to caress my cat or prepare dinner.

What is one of the most challenging aspects of your work?

As I do not have previous approaches, I like to start from a very simple sketch, a few lines, dare to take the first stroke in itself is a challenge. I also like to complicate my work since I also work on black and white photographs.

Are there any particular methods or approaches you use to help with this particular challenge and how do the help?

I think it’s an instinctive thing, I look at the colors of the palette and there is one that attracts my attention and I start to stain with it. Then you have to go nuancing following the dictates of the subject, correcting, removing and putting until you realize that it is finished.

Often our greatest strength is also our greatest weakness, what is yours and how does it affect your work?

I have a lot of energy when painting, but that same energy runs out soon, so I must do it and take some rest which allows me to forget the eggplant in which I am immersed.

What do you believe or like to do that many people may think is crazy or unusual?

I like to stain, I love the stain it suggests. See how different forms than expected are born on the canvas, I love it.

Which part of the world do you live and what do you like about it?

I live in Barcelona (Spain), I have always lived here, I love the light between soft and intense that the Mediterranean has and its colors. I feel like I am Barcelonian.

If you had a quote, proverb or a mantra printed on your shirt or tattooed on your skin, what would it say?

I don’t know who I am, but I know that I am.

What are your favorite colors at the current moment and what do they remind you of?

I like violet, it seems deep and spiritual. The orange is between childish and passionate. Blue absolutely present, infinite, timeless. The pink, delicate and kind. The temples and shadows, always ready to sweeten the other colors. The green to compose gray with the red and to express the juicy, the vegetable, the fresh. Yellow as pure light. The red as presence and attention call.

What do you think is one of the biggest challenges the world is facing at the moment and what can we all do to help?

One of the problems of the world is its dispersion, the forgetfulness of human nature, the profit motive above all things. Against all these and other things that entangle authentic human nature, silence and meditation helps a lot. Culture and art are two effective remedies. Training and quality education that allow and sponsor free thinking could change the world instead of producing alienated people from themselves.

If you weren’t an artist what would you be doing instead?

I like reading, listening to music, walking and especially thinking. I do not do otherwise.

Why do you think art is important to you or the world?

As I said before, the most important thing is the power of concentration on what we are passionate about and what we are part of, what is closest to defining and integrating ourselves into the world.

Do you have a signature dish of food that you like to cook? if so what is it, how do you make it, and which occasions do you make it?

I cook every day. One of my favorite dishes is the potato omelet. I usually do it when my children come home to eat, they say that it suits me very well.

If you could time travel to visit any time when would it be and why?

Well, the truth is that I would like to travel to the future with the hope that humanity would have overcome selfishness and petty interests.

If you could invite 3 famous people from the past to a dinner party who would they be and why?

I think inviting God, no one else would be needed.

If you went back in time and could give advice to your younger self what would it be?

I would tell him that everything he did was good, that in the future he will have overcome everything that bothered him and would appreciate being who he was.

Are there any particular artists, people or paintings that have greatly influenced or inspired you in your life or work?

As a child, I looked at the illustrations of a book that my father had and reproduced the work exhibited in the Prado Museum. I was always impressed by Goya and Velázquez. As a young man he used to visit many art galleries of Barcelona, was always impressed by the mastery of the great painters that this land has been given. I think that my painting looks somehow like Joan Abelló’s, although I also drank a lot from the French Impressionists.

Are prints available of your work, and if so where can they be viewed or purchased?

I don’t think they are, unless I know.

Where can people find out more about what you are, purchase your work, and what’s the best way to get in touch with?

I currently post work on Instagram and Facebook. I have my own website for years, although it is no good. The best way to get in touch with me is via my email. arturoesro@gmail.com