Juan Barjola Biography

1919 - 2004, Spain

A master Spanish painter and graphic artist, Juan Barjola is often credited as being one of the most important representatives of the ?Nueva Figuracion? or NEW FIGURATION in Spain. His style, best described as REPRESENTATIVE EXPRESSIONISM, was one which broke with the prevailing contemporary trends of abstraction and informalism, in Spain.

Barjola trained at las Escuelas de Artes y Oficios of both Badajoz and Madrid, as well as la Escuela de Bellas Artes of San Fernando. Three years after his first exhibition in 1957 in Madrid, he was offered a grant by the Juan March Foundation to travel to Paris and Belgium. There he was deeply influenced by his exposure to the expressionist paintings of James Ensor and Francis Bacon. Another artist whose work left a lasting impression on Barjola is Francisco de Goya, whose series of canvasses and lithographs dedicated to world of bullfighting inspired Barjola?s own affinity for the subject. Other preferred themes in his work are dogs, women and judges.

In 1985 Barjola was awarded the National Fine Arts Prize. Shortly after, in 1988, the museum that bears his name and holds the largest collection of his work was inaugurated in Gijon.

SELECTED MUSEUMS AND COLLECTIONS - Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao - Museo de Bellas Artes de Oviedo - Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia de Madrid

SELECTED ARTICLES: - Juan Barjola. Retrospectiva

Arte10, 2006 - Juan Barjola, Premio Nacional de Artes Plasticas

El Mundo, 22 diciembre, 2004 - Los pasos de la mirada

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