Pepe and his self-perception

I spend hours and even days suffering in my studio before I start a work, a painting. These are not moments you can describe because, once you have the ideas and have mastered the technique, the actual act of creating, of producing art, is a mystery that not even the artist can explain, as he stands there in front of the canvas, the paper or whatever else it is. The artist holds all of this within himself; it infuses him to the very depths of his being; but I am saying this about myself, of course: my paintings are born, they are part of me. I have never taken drugs, alcohol or any other stimulant to paint or draw; not even the pipe which I otherwise smoke a lot. When I’m working, I totally give myself over to my art, in the knowledge that I am responsible for what I am doing.

I am tired. In less than two months since arriving in Cuenca, I have created ten pictures, each 100x90. I worked hard to get rid of the things that had been building up inside me; I don't know. It was if the days, the hours, were one long wait for me. Only when I was painting did the hours pass a little more easily. Now it’s as if I'd been hollowed out. It's a beautiful series of paintings; the deliveries went well. I think my work is becoming more personal and more authentic with each painting, because when I work, I paint with total dedication, knowing what my paintings are supposed to represent, that's the way I think an artist should be. We can forget those stories and fake things that many people confuse with painting. If the painter is not honest with himself and his work, if he doesn’t paint the truth of what he feels, his paintings will mean nothing to humanity, they will never carry the secret or the message of their real meaning for people.
Yes, creating and giving birth to works of art is indeed terrible, but it also gives great satisfaction to the man who does it.

These latest drawings and pictures I’m creating at present have a lot going on in them. They are not paintings just for the moment; they need, they demand more. My whole life resonates within them. They don’t stop at a single expression, they are like explosions, like symphonies, but symphonies of volume and form, everything is floating and yet holding on to everything else, as if the things in them didn’t want to be separated from each other. Everything is transparent and yet full of colour; colour and forms flow freely, experiencing the moment, and yet they are somehow free and joined at the same time. One day we’ll have a better idea of how to look at these pictures and understand them. That stands to reason. But I make them because they stream out of me, because I feel them and must create them. It is like the breath of life.

Once again, I find myself reading an art magazine out of which I get about as much as I do from all the rest. Art, or at least what goes by the name of art today, has been turned into nothing more than a business, mainly determined by certain unscrupulous people who will stop at nothing. Of course there is no purity in art. There have always been very few creators, and there are probably fewer today than in the past. It’s true that a huge fuss is being made about this, but there’s not much art. Yet I notice that most of the people who talk about art and painting always try to tear down painters and true artists, and especially those of us from the south. There is a certain envy towards us. But I believe that in the painters and artists from the south, from Andalusia, there is more truth than in the others. There have always been true artists and good painters among them. That's how it was and how it will always be.

I don't know how, but we are different and our work expresses skill, knowledge, feeling and creation; a work of art says something fundamental to human beings, and comes closer to them; it carries that personality and quality within it, because making a picture is not simply about painting it; there must be something else, it must radiate something that it can get from a true artist.

Thoughts about youth and art
I am asked what art means for young people. I think the majority of young people don’t even know what art is and take no interest in it. Young people see art as something remote, cold, or as nothing at all. Some of them see it as nothing but a spectacle, a show.
Children need to have contact with art from a very early age, just as they are taught other things, obviously without influencing them, but in a way that they can discover what art is for themselves. Children are given war toys and it is dreadful the way adults play on a child’s innocence, and how proud they are to have given their child the latest model of a machine gun some weapons manufacturer has brought out on to the market.
Children must be taught love and peace, and art carries all that within it. What would the world be without art? Music, literature, poetry, painting, sculpture, architecture…but when we’re young, of course, we only get taught practical things, things that are useful, and the things that grown-ups want us to learn.
Of course, the idea is not to approach art as something completely irrelevant in the way teachers take their pupils to museums just so they can complete their tasks in a rational way: as if the pupils were visiting a pantheon or a cemetery, to which they feel cold and distant. That way of course, the child sees art as something cold and distant too, like a ghost. Only once they are older do they start to take an interest in art because life shows them the art of people, and then they can finally take an interest in this or that artist, and actually experience and understand their art.
It's sad but true that people today know nothing about art; that has to be acknowledged. And they are never told about art or the people that make it. They are just told about it in passing, without attaching any importance to it, as if it were something superfluous. That’s why the world fails to recognise the feelings and struggle of the man who makes art, good art; for let us never confuse academy with creation. The artist is born an artist, then moulds himself through his work, through his struggle. Others make a business out of it. Too bad for them.
What else can I say about art? It pains me that people are unable to understand artists and their art. That they see artists as peculiar creatures. Were we to pay more attention to beauty, then the world would be a better place for all of us.
And of course artists have the right to live well, because they bring beauty into the world and leave it for posterity.
Artists are made by God, God puts them in this world so they can show beauty and sensibility to humanity. Many people think that they’ll learn drawing and painting by going to school and then they’ll be an artist. How wrong they are! The artist is born an artist, then moulds himself through his work, through his struggle.  Creation comes from within. Artists carry their character and style under their skin, inside their heart.
Making art means living, feeling and communicating with other people. Not all artists transmit a message in their work, because painting is one thing; creating is another.

Thoughts
I’m in my studio in Junkergasse in Bern, looking at the last picture I’ve made. It’s a ‘drawing-painting’ on canvas, as I call them, measuring 120x100.

One day, people will have to say a lot about my work, my art, the way I say things. I paint light, transparency, expression, feeling – that is my way I feel it. What is colour? Light. It is light that gives things their colour. But most painters only fill up their pictures with colour. I feel light, I paint light, transparency. That is what it is – form and expression, what else? And, of course, I do that within my own lines, in my own style.

I was born in Málaga on 1 July 1930 to dear, good parents. I was born under Cancer, which means I’m intuitive, affectionate and homely. My life is art, painting. My shyness gives away my Cancer sign, as everyone who knows me well can attest.
I spend whole days in my studio, which is my real home; I love order and good taste. I never feel lonely; I don’t even know what that means, because my intuition is always at work. To be creatively active – to paint in my case – you have to be alone, completely undisturbed. At that moment, even the smoke from my pipe can disturb me, so complete is my devotion to my work.
When I draw a line – how many kilometres have I drawn already? – forms and life arise from it; I love life. Art is not about copying, it’s about interpreting, it’s about expressing the maximum with the minimum; and my line has a lot to say.
My painting, love and friendship are important to me. I love the sea and sun of my Málaga. I’m fascinated by the forests and mountains of Switzerland. I also enjoy chatting with friends at home over a glass of good wine. Poetry inspires me, classical music fulfils me, and I swing along to the sound of flamenco. I simply love life.
I am grateful to life, for everything I experience and for my health. Drawing and line are deeply anchored within me.
Love and humanity mean a lot to me, they are what make life worth living; I respect people who are honourable and sincere. I detest falseness and falsehood.
It’s autumn 1986 at 13, Kirschgarten in Aarau. So here we are, continuing along our way, full of faith and joy, despite all the adversities. Long live life!

Not copying things, expressing yourself and putting your heart into it. Art is not about the making, it’s about the expressing; about saying a lot, or the maximum, with the minimum; being different from the usual tropes, both in form and technique; having your own personal technique and personal idea of everything, as a man and as a painter, being true to yourself and respecting other people, being sensitive to the things and people around us, confronting pain and experiencing pleasure with joy. Love then, always; without it, life would be nothing at all. It’s not just making the picture, it’s getting inside the picture, even if little bits of your own skin get stuck to it in the process, what does that matter if the subject matter touches other people? Being authentic, however hard – or at least trying to be – helps us in life.