The son of a civil servant from Tortosa, Antonio completed his secondary studies in Barcelona, where he simultaneously cultivated his taste for poetry, a passion that would later lead him to illustrate bibliophile editions of Paul Éluard and Jean Breton. From 1945, he painted portraits and landscapes of Cerdanya, revealing his artistic sensibility early on.
His training was enriched by attendance at the French Institute in Barcelona and creative stays in Ibiza, where he immortalized the world of fishermen and farmers. His influences drew from Romanesque art, Zurbarán, Rembrandt, Goya, and Isidre Nonell. His first solo exhibition in Barcelona in 1950 marked his official debut.
Moving to Paris transformed his vision: he discovered Van Gogh and Picasso, first settling opposite the Bateau-Lavoir and then on Avenue d'Italie. His travels to Holland, Germany, and Scotland broadened his pictorial horizons.
Raymond Suillerot organized his first Parisian exhibition in 1955, becoming its permanent gallery owner. This period saw the birth of his first lithographs and engravings. From 1959, he sought a new visual language, heralding the New Figuration.
The evolution of 1965 places man at the center of his concerns. His painting manifests a radical simplification, a formal stripping down to the essential. Gérard Xuriguera places him among the expressionists like Francis Bacon, John Christoforou and Bengt Lindström, creators of a "disfigured figuration" characterized by formal suggestion and feverish gestures.
In 1971, he diversified his practice with sculptures, ceramics, and wall decorations. He died in November 2008 and is buried in the Villette cemetery, leaving a body of work that bears witness to the evolution of contemporary figurative art between Spain and France.
Retry
