Marti

This drawing of Barcelona made by Carlos Martí Arís on a café paper napkin condenses in synthesis the city layout by means of brief and precise traces.

It can be defined as a deeply architectural abstract drawing. Were it nothing but an abstract drawing, as in abstract painting, it would not represent anything, rather, its value would be derived from its plastic strength. In this case, because of its architectural nature, its abstraction consists in showing not the appearances of things, but its essence. The city is expressed as a system of relations that reveal the invisible order that structures it and makes it comprehensible.

But, owing to its high degree of abstraction, only to the eyes of whoever knows it, is given to recognize a deep charge of meaning behind each stroke and discover the topography, the sea, the geometry and the history of this millenary city.

Only a master can reflect so much with so very few lines.

Elisa Valero Ramos, January 2010.

Recommended bibliography:
- Carles Martí Arís, Silencios elocuentes, Barcelona, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, 1999.
- Carles Martí Arís, "Abstraccióm en arquitectura:una definición", DPA, 16, june 2002, p. 6-9.
- Carles Martí Arís, La cimbra y el arco, Barcelona, Fundación Caja de Arquitectos, 2005.
- Carles Martí Arís [et al.], Incursiones arquitectónicas. Ensayo a cuatro bandas, Granada, Universidad de Granada, 2009
- Elisa Valero Ramos, Ocio peligroso. Introducción al proyecto de arquitectura, Valencia : General de Ediciones de Arquitectura, 2006.

© by Elisa Valero Ramos’s texts
Elisa Valero Ramos is teacher of Expresión Gráfica Arquitectónica y en la Ingeniería (Architectural Graphics Expresión and in the Engineering ) at the la Superior Technical Scool of Architecture (Escuela Técnica Superior de Arquitectura) of Granada, Spain.