Catálogo de la exposición - Fundación César Manrique

Barcala, Art from Silence
María Martín y Hdz.-Cañizares
Writing about someone or something may appear to be an exercise in sovereignty over that
person or subject. But even assuming that were true and such an exercise could be
controlled or kept in rein, it is healthy for the writer to bear in mind that while the view
afforded by the distance from which one writes about anyone or thing may be broader and
in certain cases clearer, it is never complete: it never gives even a glimpse an individual’s
innermost, secret reasons. Any text or opinion is, therefore, necessarily cloaked in
subjectivity, regardless of the author’s erudition or command of the subject.
I’ve approached Washington Barcala’s oeuvre from different angles at different times in my
life: meeting the artist, working and organising different exhibitions of his works, in dealings
with his family, visiting his friends, acquaintances and places where he stayed... I met him
shortly after he departed from Madrid to return to Montevideo; elderly and ill at the time,
he nevertheless retained the elegance for which he had apparently always been known. He
was sparing in words, almost apologetic; calm and silent, he mostly listened. His wife María
Elena was very communicative, on the contrary, and I continued to correspond with her
until I was able to pay her a visit later in Montevideo, where she lives among her husband’s
works and remembrances.
Although I had seen Washington Barcala’s oeuvre in a number of collections, I had not
actually felt its full force until a few years after his death in 1995, when we organised an
exhibition in his honour in the Jorge Mara Gallery in Madrid. It was then that I discovered
the delicate sensitivity so characteristic of this artist, his very personal, meticulously and
minutely depicted world, his ability to serenely convey enormous emotion. I would later
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