#generation 27

Manolo Millares (1926-1972) was a Spanish artist known for his use of sackcloth in his work. Primarily an abstract expressionist (”informalismo” follower), dadaism, collage, assemblage art, arte povera, affichage, dripping and action painting were not unfamiliar to him, in an unclassifiable hodgepodge of a style, as were fracture and Weltschmerz of man in post-Civil War Spain, whose plight he also tried to express in his work. At any rate, "Goya’s most beloved son” ("hijo entrañable de Goya"), as someone put it once, or "a genuine artist, no less," as André Pieyre de Mandiargues said.

Poet Rafael Alberti dedicated this piece to Millares in 1965.

Portrait of Manolo Millares.

Millares 1965

In Rome or in Paris, New York, Buenos Aires, Madrid, Calcutta, Cairo...

all over the place, still, there lies ragged sackcloth, mangled shoes grown into the bone, stumps, hard debris, calcified remains, deep pits, dry landscapes in long-forgotten rust, or in congealed blood, in human skin, shriveled akin to dead lava, tragic wrinkles, signs that accuse, that scream, even though mouthless, silent howls that hurt as much as silence does.

Whence all this rubble, the crippled shatter, vents that grow bigger by the minute, slow ribbons of tatter'd weave, jumble of curdy rubbish, chalky dust cloud, bright reds, whence then?

What's to spring thereof, what's to happen, what's to sprout of this violent fright, what's to vanquish these blind, sorry hides once one starts shredding the threads, or suddenly bites at the open seams, illuminating the color black, the minium and the calcium that gleam imperceptibly, able to conceive of the newest beauty? Oh, but then, meanwhile, a "Caution, danger of death" lurks in hiding beneath all the darn, fretted reality.

Keep your hands off, don't you wave a finger, you the oversensitive killjoys. Rats, don't you dare sneak down these drains. Livid from usury, paled with nothingness, back off, back off, don't you step over here, don't you try to even leave a footprint, nor drop a nascent glance. An electric storm is advancing that Will surely scorch you, and so will a lightning, a lightning, an underground lightning Already a-kneading at the face of such disconsolate rubble.

Artwork by Manolo Millares.

Millares 1965

En Roma o en París, Nueva York, Buenos Aires, Madrid, Calcuta, El Cairo… en tantísimas partes todavía, hay arpilleras rotas, destrozados zapatos adheridos al hueso, muñones, restos duros, basuras calcinadas, hoyas profundas, secos mundos de preteridos oxidados, de coagulada sangre, piel humana raída como lava difunta, rugosidades trágicas, signos que acusan, gritan, aunque no tengan boca, callados alaridos que lastiman tanto como el silencio. ¿De dónde estos escombros, estos mancos derrumbes, agujeros en trance de aún ser más agrandados, lentas tiras de tramas desgarradas, cuajados amasijos, polvaredas de tiza, rojos lacre, de dónde? ¿Qué va a saltar de aquí, qué a suceder, qué a reventar de estos violentos espantajos, qué a tumbar esta ciega, andrajosa corambre cuando rompa sus hilos, haga morder de súbito sus abiertas costuras, ilumine sus negros, sus minios y sus calcios de un resplandor rasante, capaz de hacer parir la más nueva hermosura? Ah, pero mientras tanto, un “No toquéis, peligro de muerte” acecha oculto bajo tanta zurcida realidad desflecada. Guardad, guardad la mano, no avancéis ningún dedo los pulidos de uñas. Ratas, no os atreváis por estos albañales. Lívidos de la usura, pálidos de la nada, atrás, atrás, ni un paso por aquí, ni el intento de arriesgar una huella, ni el indicio de un ojo. Corre un temblor eléctrico capaz de fulminaros y una luz y una luz y una luz subterránea que está amasando el rostro de tan tristes derribos.