“Con-cierto visual sentido”: the interdependence of poetry and image in Rafael de Cózar

Abstract

The anthology Con-cierto visual sentido. Poemas (1968-2004), by the professor, poet, painter and famed avant-garde scholar Rafael de Cózar (Tetuán, 1951 – Bormujos, Seville, 2014), includes a selection of compositions in verse, calligrams, visual poems in the strict sense and others that are illustrated. Cózar first approached painting and then writing, until he merged both aspects into visual poetry, and this with other arts. The interdependence of word and image runs throughout his creative career, from the seventies to the new century, as a fundamental part of his neo-avant-garde experimentation guided by an evocative and comprehensive yearning, which responds to his peculiar conception of total art. After the first part of the article that deals with the subject from the theoretical, methodological and contextual point of view, the fourth section describes and classifies the visual poems of the different stages according to their form and artistic techniques. This is followed by a hermeneutical analysis of a selection of Cózar’s works.