Inauguration of Benet Sarsanedas (February 4th 2011)

Benet Sarsanedas: we were already feeling nostalgia for this “veteran” of the Rusiñol Gallery. With his “Impressions of a traveler”, we can again relax in Nature’s serene motion, which Sarsanedas —a gentle tempered man— is so skilful in outlining with his impressionist painting. So are his paintings: Nature in motion.

It is time to start getting to know this artist more closely. The profile Sarsanedas responds to is very quick. So simple that it is difficult to get any answers from him (and he has them!). Simple, but, as the saying goes, he is a wolf in sheep’s clothing: we have finally found out that, after his main addiction —painting— there comes chess: it helps clearing his head. You can discover these and other “peculiarities” in “4 apuntes de… Benet Sarsanedas” (4 notes about… Benet Sarsanedas).

Ignasi Cabanas introducing who, in actual fact, was not necessary to present. «We met for the first time long ago, at a mural painting course next to the Monastery of Sant Cugat. This was twenty five years ago, when we were both young. Then we lost contact until we met again through the Rusiñol Gallery. This brushstroke of yours, was it like that at the beginning?». The inauguration was revealing it…

Josep Mª Cadena: «It is a long time since his last exhibition in Sant Cugat: this is a comeback in triumph. Great exhibition! Benet Sarsanedas is a painter of souvenirs for me. We observe things, we get an idea about how others are, about their environment, but time goes by and we remember things, but not the way we have seen them, but how we have felt them. This remembrance of what we felt in a given moment is what we find in his painting».

Benet Sarsanedas is a man of few words: just those he needed to express his enjoyment and gratefulness to be among all of us at the Rusiñol Gallery. Out of the audience, some were able to get a few words out of him. When asked about the body language his painting symbolizes, he answered «painting is always a fight, because you are always on the verge of failure. And the body language comes out with this fierce fight. I do not like still paintings». —«Why landscape?». «This is what I like. Landscape is everything».