Montserrat Gudiol

MONTSERRAT GUDIOL COROMINA (Barcelona, 1933 - 2015).
"Woman", 1970.
Oil on board.
Signed in the lower right corner.
Published in "La pintura de Montserrat Gudiol", Juan Eduardo Cirlot, Ed. Polígrafa, ref. 108.
With Sala Gaspar label on the back.
Measurements: 81 x 61 cm; 84 x 64 cm (frame).

We are before an oil painting in which the introspective language of Montserrat Gudiol is expressed in all its essence. The human figure is at the center of her work, with an evident spiritual expression. In this case, a woman of a characteristic expressive containment and great symbolic load is presented in a center. The clothes that cover her body and a large part of her hair, with the exception of a few tresses that are timidly glimpsed, are folded back on themselves. Gudiol speaks here of the extreme vulnerability of the human being, but without falling into expressionistic stridency.

Montserrat Gudiol began in the art world in the family studio of medieval painting restoration, and since 1950 she has dedicated herself to painting on panel and on paper. That same year she had her first individual exhibition at the Casino of Ripoll (Girona). In 1953 he took part in the collective exhibition "Current Portrait", at the Artistic Circle of Barcelona, and the following year he made his debut abroad with a solo exhibition of drawings held at the Museum of Miami (United States). That same year she takes part in the collective exhibition "Pintura femenina" (C.I.C.F. of Barcelona), she obtains the First Prize of the Diputación de Barcelona and the Second Prize San Jorge of the same entity. In 1960 she participates in the National Exhibition of Fine Arts held in Barcelona, where she wins a third medal, and also takes part in the International Drawing Exhibition of the Ynglada Guillot Foundation (Barcelona), being awarded the First Prize. In 1962 she held an important individual exhibition at the Sala Gaspar in Barcelona (a gallery where she would repeat her presence from then on), and that same year she took part in a collective exhibition held at the Casón del Buen Retiro, in Madrid. Since then he has continued to hold individual exhibitions and to participate in group shows, both in Spain and in Germany, South Africa, the Czech Republic, China, France, Japan, the United States, Russia and Canada. Among his personal exhibitions are those held at the Pieter Wenning Gallery in Johannesburg (1967), Tamenaga Gallery in Tokyo (1974), Au Molin de Vauboyen in Paris (1978), the Exhibition Hall of the Union of Painters of the USSR in Moscow (1979), the Dreiseitel Gallery in Cologne (1981) and the Walton-Gilbert Gallery in San Francisco (1984). In 1980 she made an important monumental work for the Abbey of Montserrat, a representation of St. Benedict. In 1981 she was the first woman to join the Royal Catalan Academy of Fine Arts of Sant Jordi, and in 1998 the Generalitat de Catalunya awarded her the Cross of Sant Jordi. She is currently represented at the MACBA, the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, the Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, the Museums of Modern Art in Johannesburg, San Diego, Miami and Flint (USA), the Joseph Cantor Foundation in Indianapolis (USA), the International Olympic Committee in Lausanne (Switzerland), the Monastery of Montserrat and the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Sant Jordi.