Laxeiro

"LAXEIRO"; JOSÉ OTERO ABELEDO (Lalín, Pontevedra, 1908 - Vigo, 1996).
"Peasant girl".1945.
Charcoal on paper.
Signed in the upper corner.
Attached certificate issued by the Laxeiro Foundation.
Measurements: 33 x 23 cm; 47 x 37 cm (frame).

Laxeiro began his training as a child in Botos (Pontevedra), where he had Teresa López as his first teacher. Shortly after, in 1921, he emigrated to Cuba with his family. There he worked in crafts through which he approached the world of art, from engraving to glassmaking. He attended drawing classes and worked as an assistant to the Catalan Manuel Roig, choreographer of the Martí Theater. In 1925 he visited the exhibitions held in Cuba of Zuloaga and Jesús Corredoyra, and worked designing artistic stained glass. However, due to a serious illness he had to return to Spain, settling in Lalín. At this time he left professional painting aside, and established himself as an itinerant barber in 1926, often portraying his clients and various popular types. Two years later he began to make himself known, publishing vignettes in the "Faro de Vigo". The following year he also published his illustrations in "El Pueblo Gallego". In 1930 he receives painting classes from the Argentinean painter Enrique Larrañaga, in Vigo, and the following year he is granted a scholarship by the City Council of Lalín to continue his artistic studies in Madrid. He enters then as a free student at the Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando, and at the same time he frequents the gathering of the Granja del Henar. He returned to Galicia in 1933 and began to hold exhibitions, making his individual debut in 1934 at the Faculty of Philosophy and Letters in Santiago de Compostela. After the war he settled in Pontevedra, where he began his teaching career in 1940 at the Valle-Inclán Institute. In the following years he obtained pensions from the Provincial Council, and resumed his exhibition career in Galicia, Madrid and Bilbao. In 1951 he was invited to hold an exhibition in Buenos Aires, the city where he finally decided to settle. In the seventies he returned definitively to Spain, living between Pontevedra and Madrid, exhibiting all over Spain, already as a fully recognized author. His awards include the Medal of the Biennial of Pontevedra, the Castelao Medal of the Junta de Galicia and the Gold Medal of the City Council of Vigo. He has his own museum in that city, as well as a monographic room in the Castrelos Museum and a wide representation in all Galician museums, as well as in numerous private collections in Spain and America.