Spanish Art of the mid-20th century

 Permanent

The years directly following World War II were pivotal for the plastic arts throughout Europe. The development of a gestural and abstract style that found its epicenter in Paris responded to the atrocities and trauma of war by focusing its creative energies away from previously naturalistic, figurative and geometric traditions. This pictorial movement known as Art Informel would quickly become the most influential artistic trend and therefore the lingua franca of its time.

At the end of the 1950s, Spain was just beginning to emerge from a period of social and cultural seclusion which had brought about a conservatism reflected in its artistic practices. Access to the study of experimental movements and concepts were not readily available in the academies at a time when the avant garde was just beginning to be tolerated and perhaps not yet quite encouraged. But through the efforts of a handful of artists, many presented here, Spanish Art found a way to realign with the progressive ideas that were developing in the rest of the Art world. Instead of relying on traditional avenues of learning, many created their own creative circles, forming artist groups like the Dau al Set in Barcelona and the El Paso in Madrid. Many of these artists, a number of them self-taught, also traveled to Paris and even further on to the United States, seeking out the inspiration they would bring back to Spain to develop their own evolved artistic style in line with the tenets of informalism, but one which simultaneously honored the great traditions of Spanish art as exemplified by Goya and Velázquez, and therefore ushering an autochthonous Spanish visual language into broader international discourse.

So influential were these creators that by the end of the decade, Spanish Art would become highly recognized and celebrated internationally, with highlights of these successes acknowledged with numerous accolades at important artistic events such as the Biennale of Sao Paulo (1957) and the 29th edition of the Venice Biennale (1958), and the presentation of the seminal exhibition “New Spanish Art” at the Museum of Modern Art in New York (1960). Playing an important role in the reopening of Spanish cultural and societal avenues to the rest of the world, these artists had built the bridges that would define new paths for Spanish Art for the generations to come and recognition beyond their regional appreciation.

The works presented in these galleries give an overview of the output of these influential artists beyond the 50’s and 60’s with works from the following decades, highlighting the creative diversity that developed by means of individual and independent contributions within a unified effort to contemporize Spanish Art.