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Provenance: Estate of the artist, Montevideo.
Alejandra, Aurelio and Claudio Torres collection.
Galerie Jan Krugier, Ditesheim & Cie, Geneva and New York.
Acquired from the above by the present owner.
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Exhibited: Caracas, Museo de Bellas Artes, Joaqúin Torres García: Su Visión Constructiva, May 1980, no. 21.
Monterrey, Museo de Monterrey, Exposición del Gran Pintor Uruguayo, April- June 1981, no. 41.
New York, Arnold Herstand & Co., Joaquín Torres García: Late Paintings, November 29th, 1983- January 28th, 1984.
Barcelona, Museo Picasso de Barcelona, Torres García, November 25th, 2003- April 11th, 2004, no. 299.
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Literature: "Extraordinario Dedicado al Pintor Torres García", Mundo Hispánico, Madrid, May 1975.
Exhibition catalogue, Joaquín Torres García: Su Visión Constructiva, Caracas, Museo de Bellas Artes, 1980, no. 21 (illustrated in color).
Exhibition catalogue, Exposición del Gran Pintor Uruguayo, Monterrey, Museo de Monterrey, 1981, no. 41 (illustrated in color).
Exhibition catalogue, Joaquín Torres García: Late Paintings, New York, Arnold Herstand & Co., 1984 (illustrated in color).
Universalimso constructivo: Joaquín Torres García, Alianza Editorial, Madrid, 1984, no. 7 (illustrated in color).
Torres García, Editorial AUSA, Barcelona, Museo Picasso de Barcelona, 2003, p. 304, no. 299 (illustrated in color).
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Notes: We are grateful to Mrs. Cecilia de Torres for her assistance in confirming the authenticity of this work; to be included in the forthcoming catalogue raisonné of the artist under archive number P 1946.11.
Joaquín Torres García was born on July 28, 1874 in Montevideo. After spending fruitful periods in Barcelona, New York, Paris and Madrid, he returned to Uruguay in 1934, where he imparted his lasting legacy through a workshop before his death on August 8, 1949. A groundbreaking artist and theorist, he is best known as the founder of an abstract, symbolic painting movement he entitled Universalismo Constructivo. His work brought a new dimension to modernist painting, and his influence has been a defining one, particularly on the Latin American avant-garde.
After Torres García's family relocated to Spain in 1891 (when he was 17), the young artist began his studies. In 1892 in Barcelona, he enrolled at Escuela de Bellas Artes and Academia Baixas. From 1893 to 1898, he studied in the Cercle Artistic de Sant Lluc. By the turn of the century, he established friendships with the leading artists, including Pablo Picasso and Julio González. He began to paint frescos and worked on stained glass windows for Antoni Gaudí's buildings. In 1910, Torres García traveled to Brussels and Italy; he married and had children. In 1913, he published his first book of artistic theory. In 1917 he met Uruguayan painter Rafael Barradas, who would become a lifelong ally. Before he left for Paris in 1920, he began a project to manufacture toys. From Paris, he journeyed to New York City. There, he tried to promote his toys, created city scenes, and exhibited. He met Max Weber, Joseph Stella, Marcel Duchamp, Man Ray, The Society of Independent Artists and Katherine Dreier, and the Whitney sisters. In 1922 he returned to Italy, founding the Aladdin Toy Company, and then returned to Paris in 1926. He exhibited and befriended leading cultural figures including Jean Hélion, Theo Van Doesburg, Michel Seuphor, Jean and Sophie Arp, and Piet Mondrian. With his colleagues, he formed the group and organized the magazine, Cercle et Carré in 1930, which promoted constructivist and abstract art. He left Paris in 1932 for Madrid, continuing to produce theoretical texts, and formed Grupo Constructivo.
In 1934, Torres García decided to return to Montevideo. Bringing moderninst European theories to Uruguay, he was a controversial figure. He established the Sociedad de las Artes del Uruguay, gave classes at the Escuela Taller de Artes Plásticas, and created exhibitions in a rented space known as Estudio 1037. In 1935 he published the book, Estructura, and established the Asociación de Arte Constructivo. The first issue of his second magazine, Círculo y Cuadrado, appeared in 1936 as a continuation of Cercle et Carré. In 1940 the Asociación published the book, 500a conferencia, which compiled all the artist's talks in Uruguay. However, he was disillusioned with his artistic milieu in Montevideo, which he expressed in his publication, La ciudad sin nombre.
To invigorate his community, in 1943, Torres García founded the Taller Torres García or Taller del Sur, composed of young artists including Julio Alpuy, Gonzalo Fonseca, José Gurvich, among others. This workshop served as a catalyst for the consolidation of Torres García's aesthetic philosophy, as well as a model for an integrated artistic community. The notion of indigenous constructivism became one of the fundamental tenets of the Taller. Another goal was the integration of the arts into the total environment, in the tradition of the European arts and crafts movements, utilizing humble materials. In 1944, the artist was honored with the Premio Nacional de Pintura. He published Universalismo Constructivo, elaborating his theory that year. In 1945 he published the first issue of his third magazine, Removedor. Torres García painted his final picture in 1949, the year he died. His Taller continued until approximately 1962.
In his mature phase, Torres García forged a post-Cubistic mode, pioneering a unique modernist idiom. While Latin American artists regarded him as a trailblazer, non-Latin American artists such as Adolph Gottlieb also acknowledged the impact of his work. Torres García explored pre-Columbian and indigenous forms, as well as Egyptian, Greek, and Indian cultures. In order to invent a universal hieratic language, the artist crafted unique, archetypal figures. This pared-down alphabet of symbols, deployed in a compartmentalized, planar space, was his hallmark.
After 1938, as historian Barbara Duncan has noted, "Torres García again felt the need to shift his direction and . . . to re-examine the duality between easel painting and constructive art." She goes on to note that his work from this time was "structuring man and architecture so that one blends into another." He returned to images sketched years earlier during his world travels, deploying these in gridded compositions based on the Golden Section. Tres figuras from late in the artist's life is just such a complex painting. Merging the pictorial with the abstract, three figures whose shapes recall his toys of the 1910s-1920s, are scaffolded within a stained-glass-style grid of red, blue, yellow, white and black. The artistic achievements of a lifetime culminate in this single monumental work--a tour de force, which ultimately serves as a testament of his great genius.
Deborah Cullen, Director of Curatorial Programs, El Museo del Barrio, New York.
