The blue objects, produced in 1968, mark Luís Noronha da Costa’s first use of spray gun painting – a technique he was to use extensively over the following decades – and are part of an experimental process, driven by an investigation of the image, which runs throughout his work. Playing on various levels of perception, these objects are presented as physical entities in a real world, at the same time as they incorporate a virtual dimension. Indeed, by considering the notions of ‘space’ and ‘non-space’ formulated early on by the artist,* we can see that in a complex interrelation, different spatial states coexist and overlap each other.

 

If on the one hand the image reflected in the mirrored glass introduces a virtual or illusory dimension to these works, on the other hand, the real dimension of these objects – understood as realities in themselves and presented phenomenologically – unfolds on various levels of perception. The works in fact exist both as a presence, as material and literary entities, while also corresponding to an image plane, which the artist refers to as a ‘screen’. The role of this plane, despite presenting an image which, though diffuse and immaterial, we recognise (or seem to recognise), is the materialisation of this same image, creating a duplicate reality which lays claim to a position of autonomy in the world. Distancing itself from notions of representation and thus refusing to be trapped by an external referent, the image becomes self-referential and therefore corresponds to an alternative reality which coexists with its objectual reality.

 

 

* See the interview with Rui-Mário Gonçalves published in the catalogue of the solo exhibition at the Galeria Buchholz, Lisbon, 1967, p. 3-4.

 

 

 

MBA

 

October 2011