Antoni Tapies

Antoni Tàpies y Puig, (1923 – 2012) was a Spanish painter and sculptor who became one of the most famous European artists of his generation.  In 1948, Tàpies helped co-found the first Post-War Movement in Spain known as Dau al Set which was connected to the Surrealist and Dadaist Movements. Tàpies started as a surrealist painter, his early works were influenced by Paul Klee and Joan Miró; but soon became more informal, working in a style known as pintura matèrica, in which non artistic materials are incorporated into the paintings. From the early 70s, Tàpies’ oeuvre increasingly pays homage to his Catalan identity following his experience of the Spanish Civil war in 1936, which abruptly ended Catalonian independence. General Franco who ruled over Spain as military dictator was an anathema to Tàpies and his works acted as a protest as well as a manifestation of aesthetic modernity. At present we have one of his epoch-making lithograph series Als Mestres de Catalunya (To the masters of Catalunya) HA0082 which evokes a powerful political message. Directly representing the struggle for Catalonian identity, Als Mestres de Catalunya No. 5 features the colours of the Catalonian national flag: vivid yellow, red and black stripes whilst the sickle has become a symbol of Catalonia.