ANTONI CLAVÉ I SANMARTà (Barcelona, 1913 - Saint Tropez, France, 2005).
"La folle au chapeau. Paris, 1948.
Oil on canvas.
Signed in the lower right corner.
Titled on the back.
Attached is a photograph of the artist's Parisian studio, in which this painting appears together with Pedro Flores (Paris, January 1948).
Measurements: 61 x 50 cm; 75 x 64 cm (frame).
Clavé's work developed along two lines, one of which was more conceptual and experimental, while the other remained within the limits of figuration, although it was a completely avant-garde figuration. This portrait belongs to the second line, endowed with an inner strength that subjugates us: through the voluntary roughness of the brushstroke and the boldness of the colours, Clavé conveys the fragile and vulnerable psychology of "the madwoman". Large eyes that seem to have wept, the curled hand on her lip, the grotesque headdress... all contribute to silently moving the viewer.
Antoni Clavé is one of the most important figures in Spanish contemporary art. Trained at the San Jordi School of Fine Arts in Barcelona, Clavé initially devoted himself to advertising graphics, illustration and the decorative arts. In 1936 he took an active part in the Civil War, joining the Republican ranks, which led him to go into exile in France at the end of the war. That same year, 1939, he exhibited the drawings he had made on the battlefields. He settled in Paris, where he met Vuillard, Bonnard and Picasso. From this period onwards, Clavé began to develop an oeuvre marked by a different, less classical style. During this period his figures gradually lost their precision and form, giving way to the lines and a personal range of colours and textures that were to become the main features of his works from that time onwards. He already enjoyed great international prestige at the time when he began to be recognised in Spain, after his exhibition at the Sala Gaspar in Barcelona in 1956. In the 1960s he paid homage to El Greco, and his painting at this time reveals the influences of that master, as well as those of the Baroque painters. The theme of the knight with his hand on his chest takes on special relevance, a reference that will be repeated in Clavé's future works. This period is characterised by the definitive transition to abstraction. In the 1970s Clavé's work continued to evolve, using various techniques such as collage and inventing new ones such as papier froissé. In 1978, the Musée National d'Art Moderne in Paris, now the Centre Georges Pompidou, devoted a retrospective to Clavé that made him one of the most prestigious artists of his generation. His latest works are characterised by the recreation of textures within abstraction, with a profuse use of papier froissé. He was awarded prizes at the Hallimark in New York in 1948, at the Venice Biennale in 1954 and at the Tokyo International Biennale in 1957. In 1984 the Spanish state recognised his artistic value with the exhibition of more than one hundred of his works in the Spanish pavilion at the Venice Biennale. That same year he was awarded the Gold Medal of the Generalitat de Catalunya. Clavé's work can be found, among many others, in the Bilbao Fine Arts Museum, the Tate Gallery, the Modern Art Museum in Paris and Tokyo, the British Museum and the Reina Sofía Museum in Madrid.