IGNACIO TOVAR

 Crece el fuego con el viento 

(Fire Grows With the Wind)

Ignacio Tovar’s painting, colourful and precise, is characterized by the lines that run through the canvas with a constant change of direction. These remind us of a river that moves slowly through the land or a marine current that adapts to the shape of the coast. These are rigorous paintings, that silently enter the field of pure abstraction, with bursts of light that mark the times: time of creation by the author, and time of reflection and enjoyment by the spectator.

Over the years, Tovar’s paintings have evolved towards a greater sobriety in color, with softer alterations and reducing the points of tension to a single color. On the other hand, the lines that form the channels are increasingly closer together and the arc they form is more open.  The idea of water, the starting point of his work, is gradually diluted, but in the amplitude of the arc remains the reference to the waves of the sea.

The titles of his works —always made with pigment and vinyl latex on canvas— have clear references to flamenco, of which the author is a great fan. Tovar, while listening to music, writes down some verses, mainly from soleares, which seem to him the most suggestive as titles, and then assigns them to his pieces. 

In Crece el fuego con el viento, his eighth solo exhibition at Galería Rafael Ortiz in Seville, Tovar invites us to wander unhurriedly through his most recent production, allowing us to be surprised by form, texture, light and color.

Ignacio Tovar (Seville. Spain. 1947)

During his long artistic career, this veteran Andalusian artist has received grants from Casa de Velázquez, the Ministry of Culture’s Center for the Promotion of Plastic Arts and Research into New Expressive Forms, the March Foundation and the United Status Information Agency (Chicago, USA).

His work, which has been shown in multiple exhibitions in galleries and institutions, is part of important public collections such as the Museum of Spanish Abstract Art (Cuenca), the Andalusian Center of Contemporary Art (Seville), the Patio Herreriano Museum (Valladolid) or the National Library (Madrid), among others.