Ramon Gaya

RAMÓN GAYA POMES (Murcia, 1910 - Valencia, 2005).
"Field of lilacs", 1980.
Watercolor on paper.
Signed and dated in the lower right corner.
Measurements: 33 x 24 cm; 53 x 44 cm (frame).

Painter and writer, Ramón Gaya spent his youth between Madrid and Paris, and after the outbreak of the civil war he left for Mexico, where he remained until 1952. Four years later, in 1956, he returned to Europe and settled temporarily in Rome, where he rediscovered museums and great painting. In 1960 he returned to Spain; in the sixties he traveled around the country, and in 1969 his fundamental book, "Velázquez, solitary bird", was published. In 1984 a retrospective exhibition was dedicated to him at the San Pío V Museum in Valencia, and in 1985 the Ministry of Culture awarded him the Gold Medal for Fine Arts. Since then, he has received many awards: an anthological exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Madrid and in the church of San Esteban in Murcia, the inauguration of a museum dedicated to his work in Murcia, the National Plastic Arts Award, Doctor Honoris Causa from the University of Murcia, an exhibition at the IVAM in Valencia, the Gold Medal of the City of Murcia and the Velázquez Award for the Arts in its first edition and finally, two years before his death, an important exhibition at the MNCA Reina Sofía.