We observe the transition of
Fernando Ureña Rib from a testimonial figurative Art to a surrealistic
neo-abstraction Art.
The first method is both prudent and ambitious (never a
brusque rupture.) It is a measured experimental boldness absorbed in the
next phase. Thus, around 1986, the artist began to reinvent the World of
elements, forms and colors fully revealed towards the end of the
following year. His exhibition entitled Intima produced a singular
impact. Throughout this period of gestation Fernando Ureña Rib appeared
to remain faithful to the vibrant, figurative, oniric quality of his
human subject and to the expression of growth, expansion and fertility
in his vegetal themes.
Here we sense the throb of the "Tropic" (Title of another
one of his shows) and it climatic effects on both man and nature.
The poetic texts that introduce his catalogues- poetry is
the "Violin de Ingres" of the artist-, among the emotive phrases of
anecdotes we find the hidden key to diverse combinations, organized and
harmonious, always more committed to imaginary transmutations. In
Tropico (April 1996) Ureña Rib says: "One begins to see the mirage,
those reverberations of heat which now melt the images and convert them
into a volatile, evanescent chromatic shape."
And later (Celajes, November 1996) "The river multiplied
and divided the last colors of the afternoon and was converted into an
enormous kaleidoscope of liquid and phosphorescent metals." While George
Arzeno Brugal justly observed, more directly: " Simultaneously, many of
his paintings take up once more the ancient theme of reflecting movement
and the displacements of bodies in space."
Through the real imaginary, the painter intensifies,
idealizes and converts life into a kingdom o f contemplation; a
celebration of the harmony superior to which we live every day. The
depth of simultaneities, rhythms, sequences elaborated by Fernando Ureña
Rib, and translate the complex interiors of the soul and the many
ephemeral impressions that flow in our perception and psychological
reactions.
Despite the evident changes in the work of Fernando Ureña
Rib, principally in the free and fluid versions of our domestic flora,
the exhibition " Intima" with the collection of oils (for he has
maintained his affinity for that medium) provoked, at least in us
something akin to a shudder. This privileged visual shock, and emotion
is more frequently associated with listening to a piece of music. The
first echoes of Fernando Ureña Rib's last Metamorphoses which reached us
by means of newspaper reproductions, awakened a deep curiosity and
allowed us to appreciate the symbiosis of energy and lyricism that
exalts the values of the imagination.
Our pleasure was such on entering the exhibition room
located on the second floor of the Listin Diario, that when writing our
column we could not contain our euphoria: "Is it a risk to affirm that
an artist is presenting his best exhibition? It seems no more than a
relative risk in term of critical valuation, which aside from that is
always subjective of ...if one has knowledge of the artist's trajectory
from his professional beginnings. Naturally one speak of the best
exhibition to date-the future remains open.- We affirm presenting
without reservation that Fernando Ureña Rib is presenting his best
exhibition ( Listín Diario, December 1rst 1987) , and one year later we
maintain the same preferential criterion. The impact is still as marked
in our visual memory as when discovered the esthetic density of that
exceptional sequence. Previous to that delight, which results from the
individual contemplation of each work, one can be enveloped by the
spectacle of the whole.
Evidently the exquisiteness of color -inseparable from
the quality of life and form-the synthesis of resonance's, contrasts,
tonal subtleties, all converged powerfully into substantial optic
repercussions. Jeanette Miller once wrote defensively that "The handling
of color and of pictorial material prove secondary to his graphic
abilities" (Historia de la Pintura Dominicana, 1979) . Yesterday the
lifeline of Fernando Ureña Rib pictorial work was...the line; Today, the
richness and delicacy of the palette determine in great measure the
melodic line of his paintings. It is possible that the artist
consciously or unconsciously could have said to himself: "They have
repeated so often than I am a great draftsman-I am going to show them
now I am also a great colorist." Further, the initial compositions in
the series, dating from 1996, denote an unusual search, tending to
"mute" the leaves and stems suggested by manufactured or other manmade
objects. They insisted not only on tonal gradations but also on the
unctuosity of the paste and on a three dimensionality achieved through
chromatic emphasis.
We found then those two elements that are required for
the domination of color: The intrinsic beauty of each shade and the
harmony, which results from the combination of various colors, enriched
by the subtle range of tones.
The common denominator was present in all of the
canvases. Some of them in particular intensified the luminous elements,
that it was converted into a fascinating resplendence. Although a
luminous energy reigned supreme in this show, no fewer notables was the
renewed research of form. This aspect of Fernando Ureña Rib's work can
be classified as Abstract or neo abstraction, the morphological
representative of the known and identifiable World yields to imaginary
structures, and the accentuated study of form, color and light.
Transmutations of all kind (from carnal and floral to
fruits and the mechanistic) inhabit the atmosphere, this Being either
substantial or totally airy. On the bases of this magical iconography,
we maintain our initial denomination that this is essentially fantastic
and surrealistic.
Today "surrealism" is not equated with a disorganization
of the conscious world, but rather with its profound reorganization
according to the internal dictates of the Self and the free functioning
of the inspiration. It is this reorganization, with its own laws of
poetry and harmony that we perceive in the Underworld, Oceans and
Apologies of Internal Song. ("Submundos",
"Océanos" y "Apologías del Canto Interior")
