“We are like plants which—whether we like to admit it to ourselves or not—must grow out of the earth from our roots in order to bloom in the ether and to bear fruit."

Johann Peter Hebel

There is a flower on the path at the edge of the visible that opens and closes, depending on the day, depending on the night. That flower "blooms because it blooms," and in its almost sacred opening (for the mystery it holds), it reveals its essence.

There are forms that, by merely existing (existing as a dynamic permanence), reveal the essence of a flower that tells us, at every moment, of the life that exists without why or for what.

The forms that "appear" in Silvina's paintings could very well be those parallel lines that only meet in infinity.

It becomes problematic to critique a work of art, particularly Silvina's work: to pigeonhole it into styles, names, and categories would detract from the intrinsic merits that a work of art has in itself, by simply being art. This does not mean that we cannot question its scope and mystery, but by another path, that of pure questioning, which does not require answers.

A work of art presents itself to the world primarily by showing, and that showing is not simply seeing, but observing… What the work shows is that "extra" that the artist crafts with their hands; that meaning belongs to the artist, who creates and shapes the vast scene that is presented to us every day as the world. The subtle difference is that the artist, in shaping the material of their works, reveals the earth (the dark and secret matrix that contains everything that exists).

Diverse and fruitful are the voices we find in philosophy and poetry – they themselves could be the tip of a spiral that symbolizes this questioning of the work of art, which could never be fully closed.

Heidegger – the German poet-philosopher – tells us that the work of art is the purest "without why or for what," the work of art is a fertile uselessness, and in it resides the mystery of the pleasure it awakens in us. For another German philosopher (Kant), aesthetic pleasure lies in pure disinterest, in the free play of the imagination and understanding that we exercise when confronted with a work of art.

This detour is necessary, and it may help us see some of these voices in Silvina's work. Her work is a long path, and that path is covered with "clearings" where we see a refined technique that, more than being a mere tool, serves the essence of her paintings. The plurality of her different techniques enriches her themes and figures. But there is something even more important that transcends the brush, the hand, or the working tools: her spirit.

Silvina's paintings open spaces of silence, the manifest or subtle whiteness of her paintings invites us to breathe (a breath that is almost physical, giving way to a pure and disinterested feeling).

The combination of colors, the music that inhabits her work, the figures that invite us to dance, contemplate, and listen. Small metaphorical beings guarding each corner of her paintings. Faces enlarged in their most primitive gestures: pain, transparency, contemplation. The looseness of Dance, the magic of Flight.

Metaphor-poetry. The poetry that emerges from each image seems to want to tell us small, almost dreamlike stories, a diaphanous quality amplified in each symbol of her inks, of her triptychs.

Poetry – in Greek, it is said to create, the act of making – continuous creation, a search without reassuring answers, only questions that open beyond the canvas that seems to run through her entire work.

Every artist puts words into images, gives material to the form of language, a language constitutive of the being that we are. That gift is free, and thanks to it, we can enjoy and feel the invisible, which is also part of everyday life and which we so often lose sight of.

Artist: that person who, through a sublime movement of their spirit, re-creates us, reminds us of the essence of dreams that we, too, are.

Freedom to think and create that exists within us. Silvina: luminosity.