Helena Almeida: 'Seduzir' [To Seduce, 2002] (detail)

Collection

Fonació d'un paper [Phonation of Paper]

Image caption
PEREJAUME

Fonació d'un paper [Phonation of Paper]

  • 2001
  • Chromogenic print
  • 170 x 125 cm
  • Cat. F_68
  • Acquired in 2002
By:
Carlos Martín

The phonation of paper, i.e. the action of providing that blank and inert element with a voice, with sound, seems in principle to be a futile if not impossible task. Part of Perejaume’s visual output is in the area of the apparently unproductive. He has tended to work with paradoxes, the ‘placing in the abyss’ (mettre en abime) of images of nature framed in the most remote environments or even a void; what Boris Groys has referred to as ‘ready- made sublimes’ when speaking of Perejaume.

The case of Phonation of Paper (2001) is significant: it is a photograph, which the artist considers to be just one more of the many media he uses. He sees its importance not in the format but in the act itself, the action, such as providing an object with sound and giving silence a voice. The work is thus similar to other ‘phonations’ by him, such as the Phonation of a Poet (Forvm Gallery, Tarragona, 2001), Phonation of a Space (an invitation to perceive a space through listening rather than looking (Joan Prats Gallery in Barcelona, 2001)), and the ‘De la fonación de los espacios’ [‘On the Phonation of Spaces’] exhibition (Bores & Mallo Gallery, Cáceres, 2002). Large fans were used in both works to create a peculiar sound within the room when the air from them hit the walls. His interest in making a format speak through a medium that is not its own (paper naturally targets sight or, secondly, touch) is at the heart of Phonation of Paper. The fans are placed behind the paper to generate a sound that is metamorphosed by that contact, by the resistance of the paper, without hiding the backdrop of cables that make it possible: it is that very fact, the transition between different media (paper, sound, paint), which led Pere Gimferrer to argue that Perejaume is a writer who paints, the performer of a game that oddly combines writing, reading and landscape of which this piece forms part. In that regard, Perejaume himself has said that ‘Inasmuch as there is the writing of the atmospheric elements, there is also the writing of the human being: the great writing of the human being, that which we do in the world, not just in the form but also in the sound of the world, so that by modelling a relief map of the world through our tireless activity, we are even altering its atmospheric composition and the resulting sound is inevitably modulated’.

Carlos Martín

 
By:
Roberto Díaz
Perejaume
Sant Pol de Mar (Barcelona) 1957

Perejaume led the development of experimental and conceptual art from the 1980s on, both in the field of visual arts and of poetry and essays. During an initial stage dedicated to painting, mainly in the second half of the 1970s, Pere Jaume Borrell I Guinart, known as Perejaume, combined references in his work to German Romantic landscape painting with clear Surrealist roots, mediated through the influences of artists and authors including J. V.  Foix, Josep Maria Jujol, Joan Miró and Joan Brossa. He made the Catalan culture and landscape the central focus of his works from then onwards. In the 1980s he started to expand his pictorial work with the use of other media such as photography, sculpture, installation, video and practices associated with land art. Perejaume deconstructs traditional media and genres in his works to reflect on the limits of representation, the mechanisms for perceiving and interpreting reality and the need to re-establish a direct relationship with nature and the land, highlighting cultural barriers and representation. Modelling scenes, un-painting and Oism are different strategies that Perejaume uses in his work for this purpose. At the same time, he has been prolific as an author, writing essays including Oïsme (Proa, 1998) and L’obra i la por (Galaxia Gutenberg, 2007) and poetry such as Obreda (Empúries, 2003) and Pagèsiques (Ediciones 62, 2011), which are no less important than his visual oeuvre. In 1998 he was commissioned to paint the ceilings of the Liceu Opera House auditorium in Barcelona when it was rebuilt.

Since his first solo show at the Sant Pol de Mar Museum (Barcelona, 1974), his work has been exhibited at venues including the Joan Miró Foundation (Barcelona, 1982, 1991 and 2007); the Centre regional d’art contemporain Midi-Pyrénées (Toulouse, France, 1987); the Pilar i Joan Miró Foundation (Palma, 1994); and the Centre for Contemporary Art of Galicia (Santiago de Compostela, 1996). His most important exhibitions also include retrospectives at the Barcelona Contemporary Art Museum (1999) and La Pedrera (Barcelona, 2005 and 2011); Artium – Museum of Contemporary Art of the Basque Country (2003) (an exhibition which was then taken to Los Condes de Gabia Palace Exhibition Centre (Granada, 2004)); and Es Baluard (Palma, 2006). He has also taken part in events such as the São Paulo (1992), Sydney (1992) and Venice (2005) Biennials and Prospect 1 (New Orleans, United States, 2008). Perejaume has received the National Visual Arts Prize of the Autonomous Government of Catalonia (2005) and the National Award for Plastic Arts of the Spanish Culture Ministry (2006). In 2014 he curated the ‘Maniobra de Perejaume’ [‘Perejaume Manoeuvre’] exhibition at the National Art Museum of Catalonia (Barcelona). In 2017 he was awarded the GAC Prize, organised by the art galleries of Catalonia.

Roberto Díaz

 
 
Vv.Aa. Colección Banco de España. Catálogo razonado, Madrid, Banco de España, 2019, vol. 3.