RYB — RedYellowBlue (2003)
Fire, earth, water.
In 2003, I immersed myself in an unconventional pictorial and conceptual experience named RYB (acronym for Red, Yellow, Blue). The project was intended as a visual investigation to explore the primordial union and clash between the elements of nature: fire (red), earth (yellow), and water (blue).
The Instinctive Creative Act
It all began thanks to the encouragement of my dear friend Rocco Romano, who urged me to acquire a large white canvas. On that surface, in a single afternoon, I began drawing thick black lines and filling the spaces with the three primary colors applied forcefully. The entire creative process was guided solely by pure and immediate instinct, excluding any rational thought, preparatory sketch, or predefined conceptual message. It was an act of action painting and absolute visual liberation.
The Art of the Ephemeral
The most significant aspect of RYB is its fate: the only remaining document of that intense painting session is this photograph depicting the canvas and a close-up detail of it. Just a few hours after completing the work, in fact, I made the radical decision to entirely cover the painting by spreading a coat of opaque white paint over it, destroying the composition forever.
The lines, shapes, and vivid contrasts of RYB now belong to what I like to define as the "dark side of the moon": an ideal and invisible archive residing all destroyed works, abandoned projects, or unfulfilled dreams. A conceptual provocation that challenges the claim of immortality and permanence typical of traditional art, exalting the fleeting beauty of the creative moment.
This reflection on transience and memory connects ideally to the search for analog listening described in Non-Silence and the poetics of waiting in Praise of Slowness.
Roberto Lacava
