“Few painters fascinate me as much as the Italian Michelangelo Meresi de Caravaggio. The combination of his radical naturalism and special use of light have had a deep effect on my work”

 

It was at the School of Applied Arts of Madrid where I began to experiment with colour and gained a know-how that would prove invaluable in my artistic career. After a time and thanks to my experience at the “Angel Academy” in Florence, I reaffirmed my vocation as an artist and began to study once again with great masters. I specialize in figurative painting and in the classical spirit used in the great Art Academies. In my work, after detailed investigation of light and colour, I try to capture and express the captivating chiaroscuro, in which I can feel the atmospheres that surround the images and so share with those who look upon my works the beauty of a gaze, an object or simply the line of a curve.

 

“There is nothing essential to discover in art after Phidias and Raphael, but there is always enough to do, even after them, to maintain the cult of the true and to perpetuate the tradition of the beautiful”

 

Contemporary realism drinks from the fountain of classic academism. In the midst of abstractionist avant-garde movements, for an artist to defend her admiration for Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, to delve into his work and follow in his wake is something to truly be taken into consideration.

And it is this that Rosa Díaz does, an artist who studied at the Escuela de Artes Aplicadas de Madrid, where she began to experiment with colour and then specialized in figurative painting, thanks to the time she spent at the prestigious Angel Academy in Florence.

And indeed, those who observe her work clearly perceive this veneration for the academism of the 16th century, through works with great feeling, created with a widely varied palette, which fills the canvas in a sober and functional manner, playing with this accomplished chiaroscuro, through a meticulous investigation of light and colour, as the artist herself says, which is clearly perceptible in her colour portraits.

With regards to black and white, their form while rigorously well studied, only enables her to play with scales of grey, forcing her to be more austere, to make a greater effort to achieve a totally correct result.

In her copies of the classics, Caravaggio is without doubt her inspiration and we can observe care in the details, a rich, sumptuous chromatic range which though heterogeneous is no less sober and meditated. The artist is aware of the meaning of the copy as an excellent exercise, worthy of consideration and, of course, a play of light with elegant nuances. They are works that reflect a creative joy and vital dedication.

Marta Teixidó

 

the artist

It was at the School of Applied Arts of Madrid where I began to experiment with colour and gained a know-how that would prove invaluable in my artistic career. After a time and thanks to my experience at the “Angel Academy” in Florence, I reaffirmed my vocation as an artist and began to study once again with great masters. I specialize in figurative painting and in the classical spirit used in the great Art Academies. In my work, after detailed investigation of light and colour, I try to capture and express the captivating chiaroscuro, in which I can feel the atmospheres that surround the images and so share with those who look upon my works the beauty of a gaze, an object or simply the line of a curve.

 

Contemporary realism drinks from the fountain of classic academism. In the midst of abstractionist avant-garde movements, for an artist to defend her admiration for Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio, to delve into his work and follow in his wake is something to truly be taken into consideration.

And it is this that Rosa Díaz does, an artist who studied at the Escuela de Artes Aplicadas de Madrid, where she began to experiment with colour and then specialized in figurative painting, thanks to the time she spent at the prestigious Angel Academy in Florence.

And indeed, those who observe her work clearly perceive this veneration for the academism of the 16th century, through works with great feeling, created with a widely varied palette, which fills the canvas in a sober and functional manner, playing with this accomplished chiaroscuro, through a meticulous investigation of light and colour, as the artist herself says, which is clearly perceptible in her colour portraits.

With regards to black and white, their form while rigorously well studied, only enables her to play with scales of grey, forcing her to be more austere, to make a greater effort to achieve a totally correct result.

In her copies of the classics, Caravaggio is without doubt her inspiration and we can observe care in the details, a rich, sumptuous chromatic range which though heterogeneous is no less sober and meditated. The artist is aware of the meaning of the copy as an excellent exercise, worthy of consideration and, of course, a play of light with elegant nuances. They are works that reflect a creative joy and vital dedication.

Marta Teixidó