Invisible Colors

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Josep Giribet !!!!!!!!!!2006

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INVISIBLE COLORS

!for my parents !!!

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Invisible Colors is the culmination of pictorial research into color perception. At an early age, Josep Giribet discovered he was color-blind and that he had difficulties in percieving the world around him the same way as others did. Despite this difficulty, his artistic vocation prompted him to find paths and systems to orientate himself in the fascinating chromatism of the world that surrounds us.

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!!!!!!! !!!!!!Texts and images: Josep Giribet Torrelles!!Translation: Chris Boswell!!1st edition: October 2006!!© of the texts and images: Josep Giribet Torrelles 2006!

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ÍNDEX !!

Presentació Presentation! 9!

Introducció Introduction! 13!

Interiors Interiors! ! 15!

Paisatges Landscapes! 25!

Granada! !! ! 37!

Casablanca! ! ! 45!

Retrats Portraits! ! 53!

!(atenció: revisar la numeració de l’index!)!

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Josep Giribet Magic by Odeda Rosenthal!!!

The word unique has often been over-used. But I know of few other artists whose work fits this description as rightly as the body of work produced by the Catalonian Josep Giribet. He is a master of light and of translating colors. He has had to develop a system of translating colors because he is daltonic (color blind). He has always wanted to use a full spectrum of colors in his paintings, but he couldn´t. The language of color as we know it is alien to him. So, he has taken on the task that would be equal to writing the most lyrical and subtle poetry in a language that he does not know. Yet what he produces delights the native speaker (or the person who sees the full spectrum of colors). His basic secret is that he is a master of light. We all need light for color appreciation, but for daltonics it makes a very big difference. What’s more, it is amazing how Giribet uses light to his advantage by tricking us to consider colors in their full intensity as actually being in the shade, while having our mind’s eye fill in the colors as they would be seen in blazing sunshine bleached to a pastel, (colors he cannot see). He tricks us into triggering our minds to see what he does, and to give it a new twist. You can notice this, for instance, in his painting of the Morocco market. There you can see that he presents the colors of the spices in the shade, while the colors of the spices in the bags that are lit by full sun are left to our eyes to determine. !!

Giribet goes a step further. He confronts us with the question of how white is white. This can be seen in his painting of the white handkerchiefs, and the white stucco wall of the building where a girl stands outside on the terrace, where a myriad of colors create the appearance of white. Again, we are forced to confront an experience in seeing that we would otherwise ignore if we have full color vision. The shadows of white seem to be alive with colors to him, and indeed, so they are but we often ignore this reality. !!

The Flemish artists Jan Vermeer and Rembrandt were masters of light in the 17th Century, but they focused on contrasts with dark areas and with refracted light and highlights. The French Impressionists in the 19th Century focused on capturing light, but they focused on colors may blend in a distance. They could do this with ease because paints in colors had become cheaper since the mid 1850’s when synthetic dyes were developed. They benefited from the work of a daltonic. It was John Dalton (who wanted dearly to become a chemist but could not because of his color vision condition, and the first to write scientifically on his condition) whose genius led to the capacity for noting chemical equations and using them as recipes for production of synthetic dyes in that rapid development in the field of chemistry of the mid 19th century. !!

One would hardly guess that this artist does not see the very colors he uses. Most artist who have this inherited condition hide in other arts like sculpture, crafts, architecture, printmaking, photography. If they do paint, they use mainly what are considered the secondaries or else rely on their basic color palate of blue, grays and amber (from orange to brown or wine red). They tend to work in some abstract or impressionistic way, not in realism. Whether they are “red color blind” (protanopic) or “green color blind” (dueteranopic) their color vision is limited not only to an inability to see red or green, but they may equate red and black or deep brown, and green with white, orange or yellow or red and other combinations most people would not think of as equals. Theirs is not simply a matter of mixing up dark blue with black or odd shades of green and blue in odd light. Their color confusion is constant and distinct. !!!

Perhaps, now that Giribet is a young grandfather, he has allowed himself to expose his inherited “handicap”. So many of those who have it, and at least 9% of the world’s male population do, refuse to admit to it, hide it, or are ashamed of it. I suspect this is why so little serious study

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has been done on this condition. Always a pioneer, Giribet is right on time to wake us all up, now that color-based computer graphics are taking over. In fact, he uses the computer as a tool. !!

When you look at Giribet’s work, you can see just what road he traveled to overcome this condition. His painting of the sinks is similar to what one might expect. He then dared with his downtown square of Tarrega in mid day. His painting of a Van Gogh- like room showing a red table cloth which casts a green shadow is typical of the confusion, but somehow, in his hands, we do not notice it at first. Then he came upon doing color translation for himself by way of the computer. Why not? He is a 21st Century man using a 21st Century tool. !!

Clearly, his work is well constructed. It is realistic, his selection of subject matter seems simple. It offers us the opportunity to create a story in our mind. But it is his use of light which makes the paintings all the more charming in a special way. We feel we belong in his presentations, even though he makes us work- yet we enjoy doing that too.!!

Truly, there is no other way to describe how this artist produces such extraordinarily artworks than by some sort of magic.!!

!Odeda Rosenthal, July 2006!!

! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!ODEDA ROSENTHAL has been part of the Art world for more than 40 years, as

graphic designer, exhibition director of major historic material, exhibiting artist, art historian and consultant in color vision confusion. A native of

Jerusalem, her degrees are from universities in New York City. She is the author of the comprehensive reference COPING WITH COLOR BLINDNESS (1997),

the director and narrator of the educational video TRANSLATING COLORS (2006). She has been a member of the Inter Society Color Council, the

International Color Association and Optical Society of America. Currently she teaches Art History in North Carolina.

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!Introduction!!

The color that surrounds and fascinates us: nature, food, clothes, our homes, signs, attractions, spectacles, objects, toys, books, science, design, publicity, communication, and... art.!

The color of skin, the colors of eyes, red lips, the color of a water melon, the intensity colorant of saffron, bright green fields, vine leaves in autumn, deciduous forests, golden with the backlighting of the sun... and the sky, that immense sky that is always with us, different every day, with intense blues and the generous splendor of the evening sky.!!

During my life, I have spent many an hour watching sunsets, and never two the same. A range of shades fills the sky from the east to the west. Delicate colors accompany the horizon at the end of the day. And when there are clouds, their forms and colors draw unpredictable caprices. Shiny golden lines outline ochre masses with violet transparences. !!

Colors are found everywhere in nature, some for clear functional reasons but others, more gratuitous, inspire transcendental reflections. However, it is in culture where we have developed a huge range of meanings for colors: signals and codes, references and suggestions, to attract and seduce, to forbid or warn, to define semantic hues, warnings about order and hierarchy, to transmit messages about emotions, identities, ideologies... an explicit or subtle language that we have to learn and interpret.!!

It affects all areas and activities: education, communication, the home, gastronomy, transport, fashion, science and technology, art and culture...!

Despite all this, color is a personal, intimate, nontransferable experience, for which it would be difficult to find sensorial equivalents, indefinable except by referring to the color itself or the objects that usually show it. Technically measurable as a physical phenomenon, but impossible to transmit to those who have been unable to experience it.!!

But despite having this experience, an important percentage of people do not see the same. Colors vision confusion is a congenital defect that affects all aspects of life where color is important.!

Since I found out that I didn’t see colors the same way as other people, it has been a real intrigue that has obsessed me for years. What must the world be like through the eyes of someone with full visual capacity? Some simply tell me that I don’t see either better or worse, I just see things different. But put before an Ishihara test, and not seeing the numbers that appear, and that the vast majority see, I know I’m missing something. !!

This circumstance conditioned me for many years, especially because I have worked professionally in design and audiovisual production. In this aspect, the appearance of computers and the programs that allow the manipulation of images and, especially, define and control colors has been a fundamental aid.!!

But given that I have an artistic, creative vocation, I have always searched, time and time again, for ways and tools to orientate myself through my personal world where the perceptive mists lead towards the above-mentioned confusion. Thus, it is in computers that I have found that ‘compass’ that allows me to ‘navigate’, even with fog, through my pictorial experience.!!

The catalogue for this exhibition encompasses my work over four years of research, where science, technique and artistic experience have been woven together inseparably. My great hope is that this work is useful for others who, like me, are on a quest to find those invisibles colors.!!

Josep Giribet, September 2006!! !�6

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INTERIORS

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SWALLOWS 2004 81 x 65 cm. Acrylic on canvas!Our house is next to the church. The bell tower looms over our terrace. There is a patio where a pair of swallows return each spring. It is impressive how these birds, after flying thousands of miles, know how to find this corner of the world. It is curious how they enjoy our company, so close. Sometimes they land on the cable of the TV aerial and we spend a while peering at each other. With their distinctive shape and outline, we see them swooping over our heads, through the streets and around the squares of our towns and villages. Their plumage is characteristic, black and white, but on their backs they have some feathers that shine an iridescent blue, impossible to represent. This scene accompanies us from April to the end of August, when they leave with some new swallows in the family.!In this scene the contrast between light and shade, and the colors are interesting... the enormous blue of the sky above our heads, the peace of a warm midday. A moment to live, a mystery, and this infinite instant...

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LIGHT IN THE BEDROOM 2005 89 x 130 cm Acrylic on canvas !In summer, in the bedroom in our house at siesta time, with the shutters half closed, a shaft of light comes in and fills the room with a magic light. This light, so ours, filters indiscreetly through any crack. One day, this beam of light fell on a piece of red cloth for a while, and rebounded mysteriously, magically. The doors of the balcony, which are light grey, were stained red. These lights seduce me. Suddenly, it is clear that the color of things is dramatically altered by the color of the surrounding elements. I have realized that this phenomenon, in such an obvious scene, is always happening around us. Everything influences everything else: the type of light, the time of day, the clouds in the sky, the color of the neighboring houses, the color of the trees and the vegetation, the color of the earth where we live... and that’s not everything, the color we receive from things varies, even depending on where we look at them from. The same scene or landscape will give different hues to those people who see it from different places, as the surfaces of things reflect the light more in one direction than in another depending on their texture, rougher or smoother. The color of things is not the color we think they are, but rather the color we perceive. Paradoxically, however, many of us see things the color we believe them to be.!

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BEDROOM IN FARRERA 2004 89 x 116 cm Acrylic on canvas!In the Pallars district, there is a hamlet that goes by the name of Farrera. Like many places in the Pyrenees, people

have drifted away and abandoned the traditional lifestyle. However, in the 80s, Farrera was repopulated with young people from different parts of Catalonia as well as from Ireland and Germany, gent aterrada dels dreams of the 60s in search of little paradises far from the noise and bustle of the big city crowds. The village recovered vitality with the new initiatives. The most important has been the Centre for Art and Nature that houses artists in residence. Many

painters, poets and musicians spend days there, even long seasons, to develop their work surrounded by extraordinary landscapes, in an environment of tranquility and peace.!One December, I spent two weeks in Farrera, to study and write, housed in this centre, where I met the Algerian artist Rachida Azdaou, a painter with an extraordinary strength, and the poet Víctor Sunyol, a charming vitality. My stay was in an old loft converted into guest rooms. In winter, the mountain villages are really cold, very cold, and a profound silence blankets everything, from the valley bottoms to the highest peaks. But in the morning, a bright, incredibly luminous sun revives everything: the birds that sing, the cows leaving their pen, the flocks of sheep grazing in the meadows, the cats

that recover from the chill of the night curling up in a sheltered sunny spot, waiting for someone to them leave something for breakfast... and the people, who gradually start up their day’s work.... The sun renews the life of the valley. !In my room, the light that came in through the little balcony made the whole place shine: the floor, made of old

wooden planks, worn down by the years and creaking when walked on; the walls covered by the paintings by artists who have been through there; the ceiling with its old woodworm-nibbled beams; the unmade bed, piled up with blankets... and this light which floods everything.

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INTERIOR LIGHT 2006 114 x 162cm Acrylic on canvas !!There are times in the day when the light transforms any part of the house. The light that enters through a window, through a door ajar, through a glazed panel, through the patio... The light not only bounces of the walls but also of any object in the rooms and the colors of everything mix subtly.!In this scene, a beam of sunlight comes through a little window in the late afternoon. The light hits a piece of white enamel and a yellow towel. The ceiling is painted sky blue and on the wall there is a mirror with a dark blue frame. For the few minutes that this conjunction lasts, all the room is transformed and there is a changing spectacle of light and colors.!To capture and reproduce these subtleties is really difficult: there are areas with clearly defined colors, but there are transitional places where the change from one color to another is complex and difficult to define. However, the magic of the scene motivates me to try.!!!!!!!!

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LANDSCAPES

� !FIELD OF POPPIES 2006 147 x 97 cm Acrylic on canvas!In our country, the colors you see most are greens and yellows, also earth, ochres and browns. At the end of February or beginning of March, the almond trees blossom and many fields are transformed with the white splendour of the flowers and the air is heavy with the smell of honey. In the spring, in the dry lands, the cereals coat broad stretches of land with a green blanket. Different tones of green that turn golden towards the end of May and June, getting ready for harvest. The summer is dry, the toasted whites and yellows of the stubble. The vines offer us a spectacle of golds and violets in the autumn. And the sky, immense, always playing with the blue, white, pink, orange and violet... But red usually only appears very localized in small patches. The poppies are undoubtedly the outstanding natural element. We can see them in the fields, but always in the midst of the crops or the verges, sprinkling the landscape with the complimentary contrast between their intense red and the greens. However, sometimes, exceptionally, some fields are literally covered with these fragile flowers. Then the spectacle is fascinating, the visual impact is so strong that it is hard to believe that that a representation of this can be realistic.!In this work, I have tried to simplify everything as much as possible, converting the canvas into a geometric pattern of primary colors, apparently closer to minimalist abstraction than to figurative representation, but with the essence of what I saw.!!!!!!!!!

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LANDSCAPE IN LA SEGARRA 2004 116 x 89 cm Acrylic on canvas !The fields in the Segarra take on their most attractive appearance during the spring months. The bright yellow flowers of broom appear on the hillsides; on the edges of the fields first there is wallrocket, white; also sun spurge and dandylions; then comes thyme with its exquisite perfume, later the mallows and poppies; some ash-coloured fumitory bushes, and, in some hidden corners, you might even find little groups of daffodils. In the fields, the cereals take on different hues of green, always bright, magnificent and attractive. In this landscape, like brief brush strokes, some almond trees appear on the margins and there are still some clumps of evergreen oak. However, here and there, we can see rape seed fields whose intense yellow stands out, strikes your sight and that creates an intense chromatic contrast with such a blue sky and with those wide flat horizons. The white clouds are hurried across the sky by the wind. In a short time, the arrival of summer will change these colors drastically. An austere land, but with infinite riches.!!! !! !

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" !!RED RIVER 2004 116 x 89 cm Acrylic on canvas !!In the Pyrenees, you can find old abandoned iron mines. On a trip to Andorra, I went for a walk up

a path that leads from Ordino to the mines of Llorts. A lovely quiet path that follows the river Valira del Nord. Along this track, now called the Iron Path, sculptures have been installed related to the old activities of iron smelting at the forge further up the mountain. The little river has a special beauty as the stones on its bed are covered in reddish colors as a result of the iron oxides carried by the water springing from these mountains. !

Contemplating the river, in one of the many tranquil spots, is a captivating spectacle of colors. The reds and ochres of the rocks, the greens of the vegetation that flourishes there, the reflections of the trees, the sky and the clouds on the surface of the crystalline water. The caprices of the lichens and mosses, all accompanied by the murmur of the water running downstream. A path and the river, an oasis for the senses. !

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" !!SUNSET BARCELONA 2006 130 x 89 cm Acrylic on canvas !Beside the sea, some afternoons, spectacular cloud formations spring up. On a sunny day, the water of the sea evaporates and accumulates in great masses of cloud. During the day they appear white or dark blue if they are very thick and large. But when the sun goes down, its weakened rays light these clouds from the west; a multicolor spectacle rises in front of our eyes. It is a huge overwhelming vision. Yellows, ochres, reds, whites and purples paint a dream castle in the backdrop of blue sky. To the east, and the glass of the windows in the building in the foreground, the shining western sky is reflected, where the sun vanishes over an orange horizon. An ephemeral spellbinding vision.!This urban scene, typical of Barcelona, allowed me to do a study of the colors of the sky with its infinite range of shades and transparences.!!!!!!!!!

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" !!MAIN SQUARE, TÀRREGA 2004 195 x 114 cm Acrylic on canvas!Midday in May, in the Plaça Major in Tàrrega. The streets are empty and everything is quiet. People are having lunch or sleeping the siesta. Only two elderly people are crossing the square slowly. The sun is strong and they don’t stop. The scene is a strong contrast between light and shadow. On one side, the warmth of the stone on the ground and the sunlit facades and, on the other, the purple and ochre shadows of the houses where the sun doesn’t reach. And the sky, an immaculate, generous and splendid blue. !The bustle of everyday life prevents us from contemplating the beauty of our surroundings, especially with regard to the enormous range of shades of color. But, if we stop for a moment and look around, if we look with a sensitive eye, we can discover the infinite wealth of colors that the light reflects.!An interesting characteristic of this work is that it shows, perhaps for the first time, the whole square in a single image. In fact, it is a flat projection (called equirrectangular) of the sphere surrounding the observer. This type of projection always causes distortions, especially the upper and lower extremes (the poles), but which we can correct if we can wrap it up again in a sphere. If the image was big enough and we could get inside it, we would be able to see the entire square around us. I am sure that the Renaissance masters would be fascinated by these new perspective techniques. [Time-lapse process: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5q5mIIUGoKo]!

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GRANADA

" !!GARDENS OF THE ALHAMBRA 2004 116 x 89 cm Acrylic on canvas !In 1829, Washington Irving, considered one of the patriarchs of American literature, had the

privilege of staying for some time in the Alhambra, where he wrote the well-known The Alhambra, (1832), a series of legends about the people who had lived in this palace in Moorish times. The publication of these tales made an enormous contribution to the international popularization of Granada and still draws hundreds of thousands of visitors every year.!

I visited the Alhambra with my daughter Maria in May 2004. The fascination that this palace provokes was diluted by the huge numbers of visitors. We were forced to stand in long queues and squeeze into the splendid rooms by the hundred. Despite all this, the visit is highly recommendable, letting you admire the elegance and sensuality of these buildings.!

However, we managed to find some quiet places in the intricate paths through the palace, almost certainly because their architectural modesty didn’t attract the attention of the bulk of the visitors, who are attracted by, and insatiable for, the voluptuousness of the mosaics, columns and fountains. Narrow passageways and inner gardens still allow the visitor to capture the spirit of the Alhambra. This allows one’s imagination to slip, if only for a moment, into the stories that happened there.!

Our gaze fell on an infinity of compositions modeled by the light, the contrasts varying drastically with our steps and our spirits could unexpected peace and nostalgia.

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! !THE LIGHT IN THE ALHAMBRA 2004 89 x 130 cm Acrylic on canvas !When you visit the Alhambra, it is interesting to get off the beaten track and stroll through the

quieter, less popular almost anonymous parts, but which also invite contemplation and silence. They may be as magnificent as the rooms with splendid mosaics or the enormous walls covered in plaster reliefs. But humble corners like this one, with a simple window, the whitewashed wall and the red-tiled floor transmit serenity and peace. A special sensation fills us when we see the bright sunlight that washes in and its reflection on the floor lights up the whole room mysteriously.!

The wall is white, it seems white to us and we call it white. However, if we look closely, if we are sensitive to the tenuous chromatic variations, we will see that nothing is white, and not even grey.!

Once again, it is very daring to search for the infinite and subtle shades of color that the scene offers. Nothing is the color it seems to be. Nothing shows the color of the material it is made of, but everything seems to us to be the color it should be. !

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GIRL ON THE BALCONY, EL ALBAICÍN 2006 162 x 114 cm Acrylic on canvas !In Granada I walked the streets of the Albaicín. A blinding light bouncing off white houses, decorated with lots of flowers. A girl comes out on the balcony to talk to someone who has called her from the street. The wall faces north, in front of the San Miguel Bajo square, out of the sun, only lit by the intense light of the neighboring houses, especially the church opposite it. A slow, calm, unhurried scene. This neighborhood seduces me; its steep streets and popular character fascinate me. As it isn’t directly lit by the sun, we cannot say that the white-painted wall is in fact white, as all the light that reaches it is reflected off the elements that surround it: the blue sky, the green trees, the neighboring walls, the grey ground, the cars and the people... and everything we can see around it. So it is not that the wall is not only white, but also has many subtle variations of hue, and for the sensitive eye or the gaze of the artist, is an unreachable field for exploration. But our eyes and brains normally simplify the information, so, for us, the wall is white. This painting was a chance for me to study these shades. !!!!!

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CASABLANCA

" !!KNAPINGS HUNG OUT, CASABLANCA 2005 89 x 130 cm Acrylic on canvas! In Islamic culture and tradition, Friday is the holy day. After the prayers in the mosque, families meet and eat together. They usually cook couscous, a very elaborate and succulent dish, made with steamed wheat semolina and served with all kinds of vegetables, spices and lamb. I saw this on a trip to Casablanca. In the house where we were staying as guests, the party was even bigger. With their desire to share, they gave us the best places, low tables on multicolored carpets. At the beginning and end of each meal, a member of the family goes round with a jar of water and soap to wash everyone’s hands. Then a large round earthenware tray is placed on a low table with the couscous, and after saying ‘Besmellah’ everyone helps themselves with their hands. Each guest was given a napkin, white with delicate blue embroidery. The meal goes on with other dishes, but especially with tea and fresh mint, and a long conversation. Once it has finished, the utensils are washed, as are the napkins, which are then hung out in the street, next to the front door. A shaded outer patio, but under a clear bright blue sky where the neighbors came to stare at the guests. These white napkins, edged with blue embroidery, against the white wall, were perhaps a humble sign of the feast, but if we regard them with sensitive eyes and a simple look, we can discover an immense wealth there. !!

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SPICE STALL, CASABLANCA 2004 89 x 130 cm Acrylic on canvas!In Morocco, like other parts of North Africa, there are fascinating open-air markets that provoke an authentic delight for the sense of anyone who enters. A mixture of smells, the shouts of the spice and vegetable sellers, the freshly-caught fish, poultry, piles of kitchen utensils, story tellers and the prayers of the blind beggars... The sunbeams that come through the holes and folds of the canopies mark intense contrasts on the ground, the walls, the stalls, the exotic clothes, the dust in the air... and the looks, gestures friendly invitations and incomprehensible words, the children who follow you, the fabrics, pottery, trinkets, unknown fruits and spices, all produce an immense mixture of colors and indescribable emotions. What have always caught my attention most are the stalls selling herbs and spices, some well known and other unknown, but always with that fascinating mixture of colors and smells. Under the canvas canopies, there are heaps of sacks of red pepper, black peppercorns, curcuma, cumin, coriander, cinnamon, saffron, lavender, cloves, juniper berries, bay, rose petals and a little black seed that they call Alhabba assawda (otherwise known as black cumin seed) which is guaranteed to cure everything... There are also big bunches of fresh mint and a very bitter plant called shiba that we call absinthe, which they also mix with tea, especially in winter. On old planks, rusty metal scales, long wooden spoons and school exercise books written in Arab whose sheets are used to wrap up the spices the people buy. The colors we find in the scene are very varied and saturated, but take on an enormous richness of shades as a result of the contrast between shadow and sunlight. A spectacle that captivates the senses and lifts your spirits. !

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" !!GNAWA MUSICIAN 2006 162 x 114 cm Acrylic on canvas!I wqas invited to a wedding in Casablanca in August 2005. We stayed with the Bernich family, the bride’s mother and brothers for a week. This allowed us to share in a fascinating traditional experience. The day before the celebration we went to find presents for the bride at a relatives’ home. There, in the street, a crowd gathered to sing tradictional songs, especially the women and children repeated a chant that went: !

Sla o Salam ala rosallah La jah illa jha sidna Mohamed Allah maak i jah el alí!

Then, they let out a long scream called zarguda, moving their tongues from one side of their mouths to the other. Then the musician arrived. They had a certain air of the Gnawa, slaves who, in the Middle Ages were taken from sub-saharan Africa to the kingdoms of Morocco. These black musicians performed ritual songs and dances associated with the mystical Islamic tradition and African chamanism. They were accompanied by percussion instruments, such as the tbel, a large drum; the krakebs, a kind of metal castanet, and very long trumpets, which are played non-stop to announce good news to the whole village. Their frentic songs, with a catchy rhythmic richness, give the family and guests good luck and protection against evil. The painting captures the moments of waiting for the brides gifts to appear, when the musicians rest and prepare for a long celebration. Once again, the colors of all the elements in the scene fascinate: the façade of the house, the shadows, the musician’s clothes, the instruments... and a calm wait where time doesn’t.

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PORTRAITS

" !!GIRL LOOKING OUT THE WINDOW 2003 116 x 89 cm Acrylic on canvas!This image was originally of a girl, Glòria, sitting on the ground in the Plaça Major in Tàrrega, which was full of people, many young, during the Theatre Fair. While waiting for the show, which I think was Pau Riba, quite naturally and without imagining that she was being observed, she fixed her head scarf, gathering up her hair. From the first moment what captivated me was the elegance of the gesture, with self-confidence and the anonymous expression arising from a mysterious internal beauty. I decided that the posture and the gesture could be in private, looking at the light of the new day through the window. Later I found out that this was a very recurrent image. Apart from the well-known reference to Dali’s painting, there are various scenes of a girl fixing her hair in front of a mirror. This composition has been repeated throughout the history of painting and we can find various examples, especially in a number of paintings by Jack Vettriano that show a 1

girl looking at herself in the mirror and fixing her hair.!What has centered my attention in this work is the white blouse- certainly a thin delicate cotton that lets a little of the skin color to show through. We can see that subtly in the fact that this white of the blouse has a marvelous specter of hues: the pink of the skin, blue and purple in the shadow, ochre from the light reflecting off the elements that surround it... And, yes, finally a little white spot where the sun touches it directly. The mystery of the light and the mystery of the gesture come together at any moment in life for those who know how to look and discover them.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Vettriano1

Pintures de Jack Vettriano ©

! ! MARIA 2004 89 x 116 cm Acrylic on canvas !

In summer, Maria likes to sit next to the inner patio. In front of her old sewing machine and patch a piece of clothing or alter a dress that doesn’t fit properly. It is a part of the house that is a little cooler and there is a nice light that shines in indirectly, reflecting off the walls of the patio. The room is lit peaceably and warmly. The light reflects everywhere and the colors of everything around it mix and fill the scene. These old houses have very nice floor tiles with geometric or floral patterns that shine when the sun touches them and whose designs change color depending on where you look. The study of this scene is enormously rich and complex. Only concentrating attention on the infinite subtleties of the clothing and its folds allow us to delve into an abstract composition. You could spend all life looking at a scene like this and discover the infinite richness in the colors of the simplest things.

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! ! SELF PORTRAIT 2006 54 x 73 cm Acrylic on canvas !

This is a more experimental recent work, consciously searching for the separation of color and light, between the tone and the luminosity. The experiment consists of dividing the image into ten values of grey, plus black and white. You have to look for ten colors that have this same intensity of light, independently of their color, or rather. The next step is to seek the maximum chromatic diversity but with an exact luminosity on the scale from zero (black) to one hundred (white). Once you have the palette with these colors, use it to paint, as if it were a monochromatic drawing, only

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taking into account the values of the grey and not worrying about, but rather looking for, the maximum arbitrariness in the hues of color. The result, seen on a black and white screen or transforming the image to a scale of grey on a computer, should show a “correct” luminous correlation, with values adjusted to the original model.!In this case, I deliberately chose to work on a self-portrait because of its metamorphic significance: the paradox and contradiction between the light that represents and the color that is invented, a game between representation and invention that is personified in the

image I see of myself and the one I don’t. The mysterious game between the visible light and the invisible colors. !

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!INVISIBLE COLORS 2006 130 x 130 cm Acrylic on canvas !

This painting is a demonstration of my condition and is also a definite proof of the effectiveness of the method developed through my research. This piece though it may seem abstract is in fact completely ‘figurative’, based on a fragment of one of the Ishihara test plates, where a test 2

number is ‘hidden’ in the seemingly random dot scape. Most people can see the number which is completely invisible to me and to many who share my condition. The paradox lies in the fact that I have painted realistically something I cannot see, I have painted invisible colors. !!!!!

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ishihara_Test2

!!!!!!! !

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Josep Giribet Torrelles (1953)!!He studied Fine Arts in Barcelona and since the 80s has worked with digital media, especially in the audiovisual field. He has published various research works on color. He currently divides his time between teaching and artistic creation.!!Research paper ‘Color-blind painting experience metholodogy’ https://www.academia.edu/8011370/Color-blind_painting_experience_methodology