Ángel Aragonés

ÁNGEL ON THE DIAPHANOUS PAPER OF THE SKY

ln "Dialogues in the Supermarket," Ángel Aragonés both analyzes and synthesizes the question of order and disorder in the fragmented spaces of communication, hereby closing a trilogy of messages and information subverted by the artist. His first works on this theme, "Telephone Book" (1984), presented a gahlery of characters painted over random extractions from the Madrid telephone book's white pages. The subversive graffiti which parted from pictorial word-association games based on those fortuitous last names changed not only the meaning of the ordered listings, but also the direction of transmission, sending a message back to that anonymous and infinite space where information and communication are born.

"Dialogues in the Supermarket" builds upon the two earlier series and subhiminally highlights the etymological function of the artist's name: "Ángel" as "messenger." These pieces begin with coupons and specials that Aragonés pastes over the canvas as a sort of paiimpsest which never fuhiy disappears, thus opening up that communicative space (or utopia) where his "dialogues in the supermarket" can unfold. Mundane messages are mugged by Aragonés's paint brush, a weapon that strips the ads of their street value in order to stamp over them a new, symbolic worth. Metatextuahity is the key to this artistic creation: a clash of signifiers which struggle to produce meaning; texts behind texts which set the stage for that superficial, dramatic monodialogue chock-full of pathos.

Vincent Martin