Critics

CRITICAL PAINTINGS BY FRANCESC ORENCH (Summary)

LA ZONA GALLERY MADRID (October 29, 2024)

Francesc Orench Bernat presents two works at the gallery that stand out for their subtle balance between figuration and abstraction. With an unmistakable style, Orench Bernat shows us in one of his pieces a group of sailboats floating serenely on the water, while in the other he transports us to a rural landscape of trees that seems to emerge and disappear before our eyes.

His brushstrokes, as precise as they are ephemeral, dance on the canvas, suggesting shapes that are hinted at without being completely defined. This game of appearance and disappearance generates a visual illusion in which the main motif is partially revealed, inviting the viewer to complete the image from their own perception. Orench Bernat's work thus becomes an experience of active contemplation, where the figurative and the abstract coexist in harmony, achieving an atmosphere that evokes both reality and the mystery of the indefinite.

Carlota de Carvajal (critic of REVISTART magazine) (August 2024)

Between the distant past and the remote future. Two distant times meet at the same time, this is what happens in the oil paintings of Francesc Orench. The artist makes us travel with our ancestors, who captured in the caves a rock art typical of prehistory. They usually filled the walls with motifs, linked to the rituals of those inhabitants. In the work "Any 14.019" the artist includes objects and technologies of today, following the aesthetics of cave paintings. In his works, hands are present in the same way as they were in the past.

Pablo Santirso (critic of revistart) (December 2023)

"CO2H" is a title that may be cryptic for many people who observe this work by Orench, but those who understand chemical composition can extract a message of criticism of pollution

The letters and figures in its title can be translated as the chemical nomenclature of carboxylic acids, widely used for the development of pesticides, acetates and plastic polymers. If we add to that the color composition and how the long black drops are distributed like buildings, we find ourselves facing a work of sharp criticism towards the environmental consequences produced by large factories.

Gabriel ANDARES (critic of REVISTART magazine) (2023)

Orench deconstructs the concept of landscape as we understand it in painting to develop works of a more abstract nature, which reduce elements of our environment to their most elementary forms. While it is true that his paintings can be understood as landscapes from a technical point of view, the parts that underlie it are suggested instead of being represented explicitly, which allows him to work the same sensations that we would develop when seeing a classic naturalist picture.

Joseo GARCIA (Tandem Art Gallery) (2023)

Orench is an artist with a wide brushstroke and thick fillings with a great chromatic richness, developing a thematic variety, combining abstract impressionism with figurative expressionism. An artistic vision that will not leave you indifferent.

Sonixe AVNATAMOFF (Journalist and art critic in Paris) (2016)

He makes a painting full of life, with brushstrokes full of emotion and expression, with forcefulness. It's life in motion, emotional displacement. I see in his painting an air of Van Gogh's latest creations, especially in the painting "Field of wheat with crows". His tendency is abstract impressionism, with strength, vigour and colour."

Joel RISTOL (Painter and art critic) (2020)

"We can observe in his works a great strength and expressiveness in the stroke and stain, a form of abstract impressionism where, and although some of the works are preserved figurative forms and spaces, they give us the freedom to the viewer to interpret the work and necessarily see ourselves reflected in it."

Marina GARCIA and CARBONELL (Art historian) (2020)

"The distinctive mark of Orench's work is the almost expressionist energetic brushstroke.( ...) Initially inspired by the naïf, figuration and the landscaping of houses, streets or marinas, today he has gone on to make stronger, sincere, free and creative brushstrokes in an incursion into the abstract world."

Aitor ROGER (Historian, Blanes City Hall Archive) (2020)

"The lines of Francesc Orench are characterised by being full of energy, vitality and colour. They are made from brushstrokes loaded with expression, what the author himself likes to call " abstract impressionism (...)"

Eva PALAU (Communications Blanes City Council) (2018)

(...) With the passage of time his style has evolved naturally, without forcing, from a figurative style to an abstract impressionism. Essentially self-taught, his brushstrokes are expressive and full of emotions and optimism."

Josep GIBERT (Bachelor of Philosophy and diploma in librarianship and documentation) (Works 2021, 22)

"The perception is never neutral and the events of these days lead us to identify the reds of the picture with the confirmation that we are still in the igneous cycle. Likewise, the impressionist-style chromatic palettes are a continuation of the house's brand style, but this time only half-frame. The other part could be the sea, with a rich background of life still, but that already has the laundry that, beating the cliff, rushes over it.

Certainly another viewer can perceive different sensations and elaborate different stories. that even include the enigmatic floating ball of the seabed!"

"These days we are mediated by the explosions of the old hill and its vomiting magmatic flows that are slowly sweeping away everything they find in its path.

Francisco has been with a kind of igneous cycle for some time where fire is the protagonist. Here the cycle continues, but he leaves his technique of the impressionist pallets by the rays of the paint tubes. A milky paint mass could suggest a kind of animal being that is about to be swallowed by the magma mass. The beast is horrified, but, inevitably, even the remains of its peluser, represented by the ropes hanging outside the painting, will also soon be grass of the flames.

Action, movement on a single canvas where the chromaticism and drama of fire make a presence."

However, it does not stop following your style, rather abstract, of chromatic composition with a small number of elements but very intense.

What is striking is that you have not only repeated the colour of the fire but also the dryness of the ground, the violent movement of the sparks, the suffocation of the suffocating ashen smoke and, ultimately, the power, both radiant and magnetic, at the same time devastating and devouring, of the flames"

You show us more and more interaction in your abstract impressionism