Josep Roca Sastre

JOSEP ROCA SASTRE (Terrassa, 1928 - Barcelona, 1997).
Lithograph, copy 68/140
Signed and justified by hand.
Measurements: 50 x 76 cm.
Painter, engraver and scenographer, Amat develops a work ascribed to the experimental and conceptual tendencies of the decade of the seventies. His themes revolve around death, violence, sex and architectures, real or imaginary. Trained in Barcelona, between 1975 and 1982 he traveled through North Africa, Mexico and the United States. He has not only worked in the pictorial field, but has also developed his facet as a sculptor, in addition to having made scenographies linked to dance and theater. He has directed and organized different scenic spaces for opera, such as Caldara's "Maddalena ai piedi di Cristo". He has exhibited his work both nationally and internationally, with special mention to countries such as France, Germany, Italy and the United States. Between 1993 and 1994 he was the subject of an important retrospective at the Rufino Tamayo Museum in Mexico, the Joan Miró Foundation and the Institute of America in Granada. In 2007 he was awarded the National Visual Arts Prize of Catalonia, granted by the Generalitat, in recognition of the exhibition held at the Carles Taché Gallery. Nowadays his work is divided between important private collections and different art centers such as the Museum of Contemporary Art of Barcelona.
Trained in Barcelona, in the sixties Roca began to develop a personal, independent style and created his own language. His proposal focused on recovering the look of the close and the everyday, the familiar. He exhibited for forty years in the Sala Parés in Barcelona, and also showed his work in other Spanish cities, as well as in the United States. In 1966 he was awarded the Sant Jordi prize by the Diputació de Barcelona, and two years later the medal of honor at the Salon des Artistes Français in Paris. In 1980 he became a member of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Sant Jordi, and in 1993 he was awarded the Quadern Prize of the Fundació Amics de les Arts i de les Lletres de Sabadell. Roca Sastre developed a figurative style of intimate themes, applying a personal and subjective look to his interior scenes as well as to his urban and natural landscapes. Since his death, retrospectives of Josep Roca's work have been held at La Pedrera and the Muncunill (Terrassa), Oriol (Barcelona) and Juan Oliver Maneu (Palma de Mallorca) galleries. His work is preserved in the National Museum of Art of Catalonia.