Emilio Gañan_Imaginary Numbers_02/16/18_03/31/08_ Dossier
The Galería Ángeles Baños presents the exhibition “Imaginary Numbers”, by the artist Emilio Gañán. In this project, Gañán pursues the ongoing filtering process that typifies his work, which is found within the parameters of geometric abstraction: “I like geometry, but I am not a geometer.” In the development of his work he uses simple constructions done with lines and planes, the communicative features he chose early on for the study of forms in pictorial space. He most typically begins with sketches, which when transferred onto cloth or paper are further refined, always in reference to the possibilities offered by the original idea. The use of series allows him to do variations, with a way of working that aspires to musicality.
In contrast, concepts such as “measure” and “order”, as applied to his painting, might strengthen its geometric meaning as an end in itself, though could limit the lyrical readings his work aspires to. As he made clear in a recent interview, he is not afraid to show certain values related to “transcendence”: “Yes indeed, there is a vision of a cosmic order that aspires to transcendence, yet at the same time I introduce certain contradictions into my work that reveal ‘impurities’, making the pieces more inhabitable, but above all more sincere.”
Emilio Gañán was born in Plasencia, Cáceres, in 1971, and lives and work in Madrid, Plasencia and Salamanca, where he teaches at the University.
Emilio Gañán has a degree in Fine Arts from the University of Salamanca, with a major in Painting. It was precisely at that university, in the gallery of the Faculty of Geography and History, where he had his first solo exhibition in the year 2000. Working within the broad field of geometric painting, his work is characterised by a kind of mathematical order that is determined by factors referring to symmetry, balance and simplicity. In recent years, Gañán has elaborated a lexicon featuring lines, points and planes, the linguistic features he employs for the study of the relationships of forms in pictorial space, weaving together an expressive system in constant evolution. For Javier Hernando, Gañán’s aesthetic works as a “sensorial geometry”, where the orchestration of colour and its application on the surface refers to the media employed, as well as to the pure sensuality of matter. This does not mean that he pays less attention to formal rigour, something formulated in three dimensions for the installation project “Vacío Figurado” [Figured Void], seen in 2009 at the Museo Extremeño e Iberoaméricano de Arte Contemporáneo (MEIAC).
Gañán’s work is found in a number of important collections: Caja Madrid, MEIAC, Colección DKV, Casa de Velázquez de Madrid, Spanish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Norman Foster Collection, College of Spain in Paris, Colección Cajasol and the collection of the Real Academia de España in Rome. He has participated in numerous group exhibitions and art fairs, as held in cities such as Madrid, Bogota, Caracas, Lisbon, Badajoz, Pamplona, Seville, Cáceres, São Paulo, Mérida, the Azores and Salamanca.