Fragments of Light

Monthly Archives: July 2018

Universal Understandings

Susana Reberdito’s abstractions present a tension between what is recognizable and the power of the paint itself.

Susana Reberdito, Océano, oil on canvas, 2001.

 

Susana Reberdito, Shinjuku Sky 9, oil on canvas, 2005.

 

Susana Reberdito, Los Otros Muertos II, oil on canvas, 1992.

We recognize the ocean, the sunset, the woman embracing her dead—but these images are so charged with vibrant and expressive gestural brush work that it does not seem to be enough to stop on the surface of the idea or for the narrative alone to suffice. 
Roberdito’s piece, “Pieta” was painted in response to seeing television reports about the 1990-91 Persian Gulf War.  At the time she was painting very colorful landscapes. But with these pieces she says,  “I wanted to give a voice to mothers who, from the other side of the world, did not have it; the voice of silence and pain. That’s why the black and white— “Pieta”—the quintessential sign of maternal pain, universally understood. A sadness in which the color itself would have been an insult to so many mourning mothers.”

Where do these pieces lead you?

Biography
Susana Reberdito was born in 1962 in San Sebastián, trained in Madrid and New York, and since 1995 is based in Walldorf, Baden-Württemberg,Germany. Her work has been widely exhibited.
View more of her work on her website: www.susanareberdito.net.