After he had initially studied law, Antoni Tàpies embarked on a self-taught career as a painter in 1946. He drew significant inspiration from the circle of young poets, writers, and artists in Barcelona associated with the avant-garde magazine Dau al Set, which he co-founded in 1948. His first successful exhibitions in Barcelona helped him win a scholarship from the French government to study in Paris in 1950. In Paris, he came into contact with artists of the Art Informel movement, including Jean Fautrier and Jean Dubuffet, who were creating a completely “different” art form based on the roots of Surrealism. Antoni Tàpies also used a more textured approach to his paintings, mixing sand and other materials into the oil paint to create rough, wall-like structures. He scratched his sparse repertoire of symbols into these structures, incorporating materials that were not typically used in art. From the 1960s onwards, Antoni Tàpies gained international recognition, received numerous prizes and awards, and his works were shown in important exhibitions such as the Venice Biennale and the documenta in Kassel.

Tàpies’ work “Balancí” from 1991 combines his radically modern understanding of art with a compelling effect of dark, earthy material and encrypted symbolism. The ornate outlines of a rattan rocking chair are carved into the impasto layer applied to the wooden panel, while only the extended backrest is slightly highlighted in beige and light brown tones. The chair is a recurring motif in Tàpies' repertoire of everyday objects, alongside doors, windows, slippers, and feet. According to Manuel J. Borja-Villel, former director of the Fundació Antoni Tàpies in Barcelona, this was partly due to the artist's desire for a high recognition value. In “Balancí,” several other shapes reminiscent of a padlock or a basket complete the enigmatic, dark, and mystical ensemble of objects, which subtly reflects questions of human existence and acts as a mirror of the real world without providing explanations or concrete narratives. For Tàpies, as Manuel J. Borja-Villel describes it, advocates a "thoughtful and transcendental aesthetic in a civilization that is too focused on the logos (...) (...) Art can only exist as fiction..." (Manuel J. Borja-Villel, in: Belén Diaz de Rábago (ed.), Antoni Tàpies, exhibition catalog, Barcelona 2000, pp. 13-16, here p. 16). [AR]