"Mascarons". Lluís Ventós at Sala Parés.

"There are gestures that reveal much more than they seem. Making a list, for example. Choosing and organizing the names of twenty-six ships that have marked a life. It may seem like a simple exercise, but it is not. It is an act of honesty, of memory, of courage, of memories, of organizing emotions, of drawing a line between the past and the present. Because naming ships?like naming feelings, affections, wounds, lights, and shadows of oneself?means assuming that everything one has been passes through these floating metaphors. In Lluís Ventós, the work has shaped him, but also the soul.

This is what he has done with this exhibition. He has returned to the ships that have crossed him and those he has crossed. He has put wood, iron, and intuition where others would only see a boat. And he has turned twenty-six vessels into twenty-six figureheads. However, attention, here it is not about representing any ship. It is about inhabiting it, making it speak. Each figurehead is a fragment of life; a sculptural confession; a story that unfolds like a sail. They are pieces born of touch, memory, and love. Love for the sea, his, and a way of life that is also a way of resisting. Because, in reality, the exhibition is not a series of isolated objects, but a single sculpture made up of twenty-six pieces.

A work of essential, clean, and refined forms between pure geometry?circle, column, spiral, vertical line?and organic form?wing, tentacle, anthropomorphic or animal body. Volumes often combine in subtle balance games, with structures that appear fragile but convey inner strength and always tension between movement and stability. Lluís works the wood in a living state, maintaining its knots, grains, cracks, and scars, as if each piece retains the memory of the material. Natural texture combined with polished and smooth surfaces contrast with rough or unfinished areas, to suggest the duality between what has been worked and what has been experienced. The contrast between light and dark woods helps to mark symbolic oppositions: light/darkness, sea/land, life/death, self/others.

Lluís knows how to make wood, metal, and emptiness speak. The sculptures speak to us about many things: discovery and fear; childhood and maturity; family, friendship, and loneliness; loss and hope. They are journeys. They are people. They are everything that makes us fragile and brave at the same time. That's why they touch us. Because, in the end, who does not have their own ships?real or imaginary?that have guided us to where we are and what we are?

There is the ship where everything begins, like Pepe. There is the one that represents desire, freedom, or family. The one that sinks and leaves a trace. The one that takes us to familiar coves, like intimate rituals. The one that shows us the deepest darkness and the one that reminds us that, even there, we can light a candle. The one that lives and makes us live. The one that sails away and leaves a mark. He has looked at each ship with his soul, has listened to what the woods were telling him, and has let memories guide his hands. Those who know him will recognize tenderness, a sense of humor, stubbornness, a sharp yet compassionate gaze, and sincerity without cracks. He neither wants nor can separate life and work; everything is part of the same sea.

Do not expect to find answers. Perhaps not even explanations. But you will find truth. A truth made of shapes, empty spaces, textures, silences. A truth that unfolds with the serenity and strength of someone who has lived intensely and is not afraid to share it.

Twenty-six figureheads. Twenty-six ships. A single journey: that of a man, that of an artist, who has made sculpture his voice and the sea his path. The journey is just beginning. Get ready to set sail." Ignasi de Planell.

It can be visited for free from Tuesday to Saturday from 11 am to 2 pm and from 4 pm to 8 pm