This interview by Margarita D’Amico (b. 1940) with Venezuelan artist Mercedes Pardo (1921–2005) on the occasion of her 1969 exhibition, 1 x 9: color de la serigrafía,held at the Museo de Bellas Artes de Caracas, provides essential and concise information about Pardo’s approach to color. She asserts that the study of form provides the structural origin of the resulting composition. Pardo’s vision of color is tied to the emotional and the sensual: “When colors come together, and like a chord, vibrate on the same frequency, the result is emotional.” The notion of color as tonic chord on the basis of which simple forms act as the skeleton-key of the ultimate composition resonates with both the artist’s silkscreens on white formica and her modular combination of prints.
This interview, as well as “1x 9. Color de la serigrafía. Mercedes Pardo”—the text by Alejandro Otero (1921–1990) featured in the 1969 exhibition catalogue—is useful to understanding an important stage in Pardo’s production. For Otero, the significance of the exhibition is in the way it invents chromatic relationships. Though mostly a painter, Pardo produced graphic work without altering its techniques or putting them at the service of painting. On the contrary, she took full advantage of the possibilities offered by the flat colors of silkscreen inks to produce works to which color is central.
On Mercedes Pardo’s work, see Ruth Auerbach’s interview with the artist, “La creación como argumento” (ICAA doc. no. 1143060); Roberto Guevara, “Color y módulos en Mercedes Pardo” (doc. no. 1155991); “Mercedes Pardo: color de la serigrafía” (doc. no. 1143176)—a text that, like the one mentioned above, was written by Otero; and Bélgica Rodríguez’s article, “Mercedes Pardo: 1951–2000” (doc. no. 1143027).
