JOHN BEARD: FUGITIVE VISION
The Land’s End and other new works

Centred on The Land’s End, a set of seven photographically-altered serigraphs donated to the Modern Art Centre by John Beard in 2000, the present exhibition is complemented by works, property of the artist himself, which develop the work he carried out during his 1993 stay in Sintra. This work continued on a more Northern coastline, during his 1997 artist’s residence at the Tate gallery, in St Ives, Cornwall, from which came the pieces After Adraga and The Land’s End, which were exhibited in St. Ives, in 1998.
Beard’s painting, especially since the mid-1990s, after his Portuguese sojourn, has taken on the features of a visual essay on perception, on the way we see and what we see under certain conditions, be they times of day or mental moods. In order to illustrate this reflection on the eye, or perhaps because his own eye had been drawn to it for some reason, Beard chose the majestic rock of Adraga, in Sintra, seen or glimpsed in the liquid light of the cliff, in a constantly-shifting sea. These ‘portraits’ eventually led to a series of self-portraits, shown as ‘Heads’ from 1998 on, and to a series of works on Ayers Rock, or Uluru, which stands out from the flatness of the Australian desert. Like a rock slowly rising from a sea-mist, Beard’s head is not perceptible at once: it takes a steady eye to grasp it. Contemplation turns into an inquisitive gaze, scanning the surface of the painting in search of a contour. Gradually, a form stands out, one with the materials that compose it: like the primeval rocks of Adraga or Ayers Rock, its perception belongs in a territory of restlessness, evoking the impossibility of fixating an incommensurable reality in the precise moment we have seen it. 
Born in Wales, John Beard lives usually in Australia. His work has been previously shown in Portugal in 1995, at Galeria Luís Serpa (Lisbon), Galeria Gomes Alves (Guimarães) and the 15th Capuchos Music Festival, and in 2000, at Galeria Presença (Porto).

Ana Vasconcelos e Melo

Weekend Gallery Talks
with Sandra Vieira Jürgens
Jun. 25 at 15:00
Sep. 25 at 12:00