One day I attempted to reach silence directly, with greater resignation, surrendering to the fate that governs any profound struggle. My millions of … - Antoni Tàpies

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One day I attempted to reach silence directly, with greater resignation, surrendering to the fate that governs any profound struggle. My millions of furious clawings became millions of grains of dust, of sand.. .A new geo-graphy lit my way, carrying me from surprise to surprise: suggestions of unusual combinations and molecular structures, of atomic phenomena, of the world of galaxies or of images in a microscope. The symbolism of dust — 'to be one with dust, here lies the profound identity, that is, the inner profundity between man and nature' (Tao Te Ching) —, of ashes, of the earth from whence we come and to which we return, of the solidarity born when we realise that the differences among ourselves are like those between one grain of sand and the next..

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About Antoni Tàpies

Antoni Tàpies (13 December 1923 – 6 February 2012) was a Spanish Catalan artist, born in Barcelona, who from 1947 on, started to paint in a surrealistic style. Through 'Arte Povare', under the influence of Eastern calligraphy among other things, he soon developed a spontaneous Abstract Expressionism with its own symbolic language.

Also Known As

Native Name: Antoni Tàpies i Puig
Alternative Names: Antonio Tapies O Tapies Antonio Tapies Puig Antoni Tapies Antoni Tàpies Puig Tapies Antoni Tapies i Puig Antoni Tapies Puig
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Additional quotes by Antoni Tàpies

Everything takes place in an infinitely greater field than what is framed by the size of the picture or by what is materially in the picture. This matter [door/window/wall] is but a support inviting the viewer to participate in the much larger game of a thousand and one visions and feelings; it is the talisman lifting or sinking walls into the deepest recesses of our spirit, opening and at times closing windows in the construction of our impotence, our bondage, or our freedom. The 'subject-matter' then may be found in the picture or it may exist solely inside the spectator's head.

My drawings [c. 1945 - 1955] were almost always figures, many pseudo-self-portraits, which I often set against a kind of sun or focus, as if the whole universe radiated from my head, from a point between my eyes. My few oils make even clearer this vision of an axial character, centrally placed, facing the spectator, or turned around, with symmetrical postures, as one in prayer; they show the influence of [medieval] Catalan Romanesque art. In general, molecular rays from the periphery appear to form the central figure and converge in his head, or come out of it, and give life to his surroundings.

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