In just a few lines, this article by cultural journalist José Hernández (b. 1955) summarizes the artistic career of Antonio Barrera (1948−1990), a painter who had recently died in Paris. Significantly, the article contains segments of an unpublished interview in which Barrera reflects on the figure of the artist and on nature.
Barrera was a graduate of the Universidad Nacional de Colombia’s Art School. When, in 1974, he began exhibiting atmospheric paintings of landscapes—some of them almost entirely devoid of vegetation—that genre was still at the margins of the art scene. In Barrera’s view, the landscape theme was present throughout the 20th century. Indeed, he believed it was the point of departure for abstract geometric compositions. As a young painter in the seventies, Barrera innovated the traditional landscape genre with works that, like those painted by Abstract Expressionist Mark Rothko (1903−1970), engaged in a non-figurative exploration of nature. Before traveling to Europe, Barrera was interested in the mist represented in paintings by Gonzalo Ariza (1912−1995). José Hernández reports that, according to art critic Marta Traba (1923–1983), the quality of Barrera’s work declined once he had gained commercial success as he began to produce works that satisfied the demand for more conventional representations. In 1979, Barrera settled in Paris where he began a new phase of production, making works in which landscapes of the Savannah of Bogotá were bound to internal states. In Barrera’s words, “I have gotten to know Colombia better since moving to Paris.” These highly nostalgic works from the eighties received great acclaim from critics who viewed Barrera as a landscape painter with a poetic sensibility.
José Hernández (b. 1955) earned recognition as the editor of Bogotá-based newspaper El Tiempo, where he published criticism by Carolina Ponce León (b. 1957) and José Hernán Aguilar (b. 1952). In conjunction with artists Jaime Iregui (b. 1956) and Carlos Salas (b. 1957), Hernández founded Espacio Vacío (1997−2002), a venue for exhibition and debate on the Bogotá art scene.