Miquel Blay

MIQUEL BLAY FÁBREGAS (Olot, Girona, 1866 - Madrid, 1936).
"Head of a young man.
Gilded bronze.
Signed by the artist and founder "Masriera i Campins".
Measurements: 41 x 32 x 29 cm.
The sculptor Miquel Blay was formed in Olot, in the workshops of Christian Art of Berga i Boix and of the painter Joaquín Vayreda, carving religious images. In 1888 he traveled to Rome and, a year later, he moved to Paris with a scholarship from the Diputació Provincial de Girona. In the French capital he attended the Julian Academy, the School of Fine Arts and the workshop of Henri Michel Antoine Chapu. After three years in Paris, he stayed in Rome for a year and a half and returned to Olot in 1894. One of his most famous works, "Primeros fríos", was made in Rome and won Blay the first medal at the National Exhibition of Fine Arts in Madrid in 1892. This work was also awarded a gold medal in Barcelona in 1894, and its modernist language influenced, in fact, a whole generation of Catalan sculptors. Back in Paris, he won a medal of honor at the Universal Exposition held there in 1900, and was named Knight of the French Legion of Honor the following year. In 1906 Blay returned to Spain and settled in Madrid, becoming a member of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in 1909 and, in the following year, a professor at the School of Fine Arts in Madrid. He continues to present his work in the National Exhibitions of Fine Arts, being awarded in 1908 with a medal of honor for "Eclosión" (Prado). Between 1925 and 1930 he will hold the position of director of the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome. Miquel Blay is currently represented in the Prado Museum, the MACBA of Barcelona, the Regional Museum of La Garrotxa, the National Museum of Art Reina Sofia and others.