The visual and the vital occupy an equally central place in the life of Javier Ballester, Montesol (Barcelona 1952), to the point of merging. His desire to understand what surrounds him crystallizes in his painting. But what is surrounding Montesol? What does he want to capture in his work? Like so many in the contemporary era, Montesol has had a transhumance experience: he has had several lives largely linked to the experience of different places. In its caso, the issue has gone beyond successively adapting to more or less differentiated local languages ​​or traditions. The different “lives” of Montesol, as manifested in his artistic production, have been determined by the historical, cultural or social circumstances that have framed the cities in which he has distributed his existence.