José Gelabert-Navia – illustratör

Between 1915 and 1917 the Russian composer, Sergei Prokofiev wrote a series of twenty piano pieces. While playing them for a gatheringof friends, the poet Konstantin Balmont wrote a sonnet which entitled Mimolyotnosti which Kira Nikolayevna would translate as Visions fugitives. Inspired by these dazzling miniatures, I have assembled a jewel box containing twenty individual felt-tip drawings on watercolor paper capturing fugitive visions of China. For a country that has of late been focused on the future, I have been fascinated by the search for a true contemporary regional language in traditional Chinese architecture and painting. The intricate and careful composition in relation to landscape and light has been a continual revelation, as evidenced by the Summer Palace on the outskirts of Beijing and vanishing water towns such as Zhujiajiao, known as the “Venice of Shanghai.”

Between 1915 and 1917 the Russian composer, Sergei Prokofiev wrote a series oftwenty piano pieces. While playing them for a gathering of friends, the poet Konstantin Balmont wrote a sonnet which entitled Mimolyotnosti which Kira Nikolayevna would translate as Visions fugitives. Inspired by these dazzling miniatures, I have assembled a jewel box containing twenty individual felt-tip drawings on watercolor paper capturing fugitive visions of Italy. I have always been eager to capture the faded beauty of cities and buildings. This obsession would inevitably draw me to Venice and Sicily. Wandering amidst the shadows of the Venetian light I have tried to portray the beauty of this luminous city. No part of Italy has as many layers of history or been inhabited by so many different peoples as Sicily. From the Greeks who colonized Siracusa and Selinunte, to the Romans in Agrigento, to the Normans in Palermo.

Between 1915 and 1917 the Russian composer, Sergei Prokofiev wrote a series of twenty piano pieces. While playing them for a gathering of friends, the poet Konstantin Balmont wrote a sonnet which entitled Mimolyotnosti which Kira Nikolayevna would translate as Visions fugitives. Inspired by these dazzling miniatures, I have assembled a jewel box containing twenty individual felt-tip drawings on watercolor paper capturing fugitive visions of Taos and Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Coral Gables became the vision of George Merrick, who along with his uncle, Denman Fink and the landscape architect Frank Button, created a layout based on the principles of the City Beautiful Movement.