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Introduction to the presentation of Victoria Gil -
This series corresponds to a story of love that occurred to me in western Sahara, a land of lost souls, forgotten by the west and devastated by the expansionist desires of Morocco
My work presents a series of portraits, created using ink on yellow paper, drawings that reflect a shared moment while the subject posed, giving me their time so that I could capture their guests interpreted through my feelings.
This series has become for me an inner looking process which has reveled my own most intimate feelings and has allowed me to reconstruct my own past which has until now been hidden from me. It is this reconstruction that has liberated me from the presence and hardship of the war. A pain which I shared with the inhabitants of Western Sahara.
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I first met Quico during my exhibition in the Gallery La Maquina Española in Madrid, 1993, though my friendship with him only developed in 1999 as I took an interest in the anarchist journal El Refractor, which Quico was editing at the time. I became involved in the journal and our friendship developed.
Our friendship was based around painting. The admiration that Quico had for my work encouraged me and gave me confidence, confirming my feminist believes which he compared with those of various anarchists.
When he observed the paintings one could see a shining in his eyes and a smile of satisfaction. He liked strong women, and this force, as I am very timid, could only be transmitted through my work, a sort of exorcism. I still remember his words “ are you going to show me the new things you have done ?”Quico liked to encourage me with new projects that he always had in mind. I admired his ability to edit. I loved his newspapers with impressive titles of anarchistic slogans which I will never forget: “Before fighting for the classes: many classes of fighting.” Or another: “don’t spare the paint”.
The last painting I did, which he loved, was used for the poster of the Copilandia project in which I portrayed two women pirates Anni Bonny and Mary Read.
His texts were magnificent, with no rhetoric; he didn’t like to be convoluted as many of the critics today, for whom he felt embarrassment. His writings where very simple, illustrated with events and stories. I believe he was brilliant with the pen and always found the correct word. The brain of Quico never could stop and will never stop in my memory.
Victoria Gil
Neilson Gallery -