VERSIÓN INGLESA ENGLISH VERSION - Fundación César Manrique

21. Aguilera Cerni, Vicente: Panorama del nuevo arte español.
Madrid, Guadarrama, 1966, p. 209.
qualities, a revival of the Spanish “bold streak” tradition which was, nonetheless, compatible with the
international tendencies of the day. The fact of the matter is that drama, shocking realism, brazenness
and blackness are key words in the definition of the poetics of this group, which was at the hub of the
Madrilenian avant-garde and had gained international acclaim. This was the context in which César
Manrique forsook the strong colourism of his previous painting to, in keeping with was being done by
the artists mentioned, adopt a chromatic austerity unprecedented in his work until then. Beginning in
1959, all vestiges of linear composition also disappeared as he focused on research with material. Very
soon the critic Aguilera Cerni certified his presence in Spanish art informel, including him in a chapter
titled “From cry to silence”, along with Millares, Rivera, Soria and Vilacasas in his book Panorama del
nuevo arte español (Panorama of new Spanish art). Aguilera stressed Manrique’s personal contribution
to the materialist side of art informel:
“The material may be soil, stone, sand, consistency or indecisive project... It may acquire any
number of forms, enclose countless suggestions, propose multiple enigmas. In this immense
repertoire, César Manrique has chosen volcanic rock (...). This was the beginning of an understanding
with the soil, the granular and surly lava of the most formidable island geology” 21 .
Manrique, then, was recognised in the late fifties as having a voice of his own, within the coordinates
of Spanish and international modernity, which is as much as to say the co-ordinates of art
informel. He would pursue this same line of work in the following decade, participating in the
international promotion of this movement furthered by Luis González Robles from the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs. Here it should be recalled, firstly, that 1959, the year when El Paso dissolved, also
marked the beginning of the real expansion of art informel throughout Spain which, in a way, converted
it into a banal and superficial formula in vogue. Secondly, it will be noted that this expansion of art
informel concurred with a different social and political context than in the years when the group was
founded. Indeed, the open Christian Democratic period of the fifties gave way to the 1959 Stabilisation
Plan and so-called Spanish Development, a phase designed to integrate the Spanish economy in
Europe, with all the radical effects that would have on Spanish society, which in turn ricocheted on to
the world of the arts.
With a somewhat more vigorous market in Madrid and Barcelona, and an incipient demand in cities
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