Antoni Tàpies

ANTONI TÀPIES PUIG (Barcelona, 1923 - 2012).
"Horizontal amb Sabates", 1974.
Mixed media on textured cardboard.
Presents label on the back.
Signed and dated.
Measurements: 32 x 75 cm; 47 x 90 cm (frame).

Tàpies' work is framed within informalism and in it the material aspect is basic; the doodle, the brushstroke full of pictorial matter, the collage... But in Tàpies the symbolic aspect is also fundamental. Over the years the artist will create a significant imaginary in which elements such as crosses are essential, in a sense that goes beyond its link with Christianity, the X, as an allusion to the crossroads, real or vital, or numbers such as 8, symbol of infinity.

Antoni Tàpies begins in art during his long convalescence from a lung disease. He progressively devoted himself more intensely to drawing and painting, and finally left his law studies to devote himself entirely to art. Co-founder of "Dau al Set" in 1948, he began to exhibit in the Salones de Octubre in Barcelona, as well as in the Salón de los Once held in Madrid in 1949. After his first individual exhibition in the Layetanas Galleries, he travels to Paris in 1950, with a scholarship from the French Institute. In these years he began his participation in the Venice Biennial, exhibited again at the Layetanas and, after a show in Chicago, in 1953 he had a solo exhibition at Martha Jackson's gallery in New York. From then on, his exhibitions, both group and solo, were held all over the world, in leading galleries and museums such as the Guggenheim in New York and the Museum of Modern Art in Paris. He has won awards such as the Prince of Asturias, the Praemium Imperiale of the Japan Art Association, the National Prize of Culture, the Grand Prize for Painting in France, etc., and anthologies have been dedicated to him in Tokyo (1976), New York (1977 and 2005), Rome (1980), Amsterdam (1980), Madrid (1980), Venice (1982), Milan (1985), Vienna (1986) and Brussels (1986). He is represented in major museums around the world, such as the foundation that bears his name in Barcelona, the Reina Sofia in Madrid, the Guggenheim in Berlin, Bilbao and New York, the Fukoka Art Museum in Japan, the MOMA in New York and the Tate Gallery in London.