Constantino Grandío

CONSTANTINO GRANDIO LÓPEZ (Santa Olalla de Lousada, Lugo, 1924 - 1977).
"Burrito", 1965.
Oil on canvas.
Signed on the front, signed and dated on the back.
Measurements: 81 x 60 cm; 97 x 76 cm (frame).
Poetic representation of a small solitary donkey, resolved as a suggestive grisaille, using different shades of gray that give the figure a timeless and mysterious aura. Tino Grandio studied high school in Lugo and then moved to Santiago, but soon abandoned his studies to devote himself definitively to painting. In 1949 he went to Madrid, where he had the help of the sculptor Cristino Mallo and the painter Díaz Caneja, joining the group of the Madrid School. In 1955 his work was selected for the Hispano-American Art Biennial held in Barcelona, and he made his individual debut in 1957, with an exhibition at the Dirección General de Bellas Artes in Madrid. Since then he had numerous solo exhibitions in Madrid, Barcelona, Lisbon, Paris, New York, Munich and Alexandria. He also participated in group exhibitions in Europe and South America. A very awarded painter since his youth, in 1944 he obtained the provincial prize of Lugo, and since then he was awarded with other important prizes such as the Stanley Kramer (1956), Cance (1960) and Unicef (1968), and obtained the first prize in the Anthological Exhibition of the Círculo de las Artes de Lugo (1964), great prize and medal of honor in the first Galician Biennial (1966), and the Great International Prize of Painting in the Biennial of Marbella (1971). He participated in the National Exhibitions of Fine Arts, being awarded the third medal in 1962, second in 1964 and first in 1966. In 1963 he obtained the Great Prize of the General Direction of Fine Arts. In 1965 he received a scholarship from the March Foundation. After his death, several anthological exhibitions were dedicated to him in different parts of Galicia, sponsored by the Fauna gallery, among which the Homage Exhibition held in the Provincial Council of Lugo in 1979 stands out. In 2005, the Museum of Fine Arts of La Coruña dedicated to him an anthology entitled "Painting with the mists". Tino Grandio is currently represented in the Centro Galego de Arte Contemporánea de Santiago de Compostela and in the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Madrid, as well as in many other museums in Spain, Europe and America.