Inauguration of Josefina Ripoll (5 June 2015)

Josefina Ripoll is one of the veteran artist which exhibits at the Rusiñol Gallery: she is about to be eighty years old (as she herself asserts). But, at the same time, her youthfulness is very heard to compete with. As a proof of her youthful spirit we see her restlessness and the renewal in the topics, with which she has surprised us in this inauguration…

There was no necessity of presenting the artist: Josefina is already well known in the Rusiñol Gallery. So Mr. Josep Cadena spoke about her directly. He said he knew the painter from a long time ago, from his youth… «Josefina describes nature in activity very well, always in movement and full of fertility. It is like as if she was saying through her paintings: “Life continues”».

Josefina Ripoll is well known for her splendorous flowers. According to Cadena’s writings, «she observes and loves vegetal life which fills the garden of her house in Teià (Barcelona). In accordance with the great mystical st. John of the Cross, Josefina would like that harmony and beauty that she sees on land, also nested in the human hearts».

The maritime theme has been the surprise. «Josefina captures the first impressions of a rough sea as it may be an upset spirit which needs to be calmed. The restlessness comes from the struggle for managing the reality that tends to escape. The effervescence of this clash is the foam which crowns the wave» (from the Josep M. Cadena’s review).

• Time for Josefina. The inauguration takes on a friendly ambience. The Gallery is full of fans, friends and followers of the artist. —«Which flower do you like the least?». —«I like all of them, but the least is the rose, for it hasn’t life». Josefina has opened her heart and she confessed that she now prefers the sea she has always seen: and that is the sea of Menorca. She has it in her mind like a photograph… Finally, her last reference was for her friends-disciples: Josefina feels satisfied with both her paintings and for having created an art-trend around her.