Picasso, Miró, Dalí and the Origins of Contemporary Art in Spain, 1900-1936

The organisation of the exhibition highlights the inarguable dominance of three figures: Pablo Picasso (Málaga, 1881-Mougins, France, 1973), Joan Miró (Barcelona, 1893-Palma de Mallorca, 1983) and Salvador Dalí (Figueres, 1904 - Púbol, 1989), who not only appear and participate in various art movements (in Surrealism mainly), but even give rise to them (Picasso and Cubism). On the other hand, it is clear how the work of these three artists becomes a crucial model for the work of their Spanish contemporaries, which offer significant and valuable artistic proposals.

This collection of Spanish avant-garde unfolds chronologically, highlighting the paths of each artists as participants in various avant-garde currents (Benjamín Palencia, Francisco Bores, María Blanchard, Dalí and Miró). The names and classifications happen and they synthesise modernity and tradition, while at the same time the rise of regionalism as an aesthetic category (Catalan, Basque) is borne witness to. It is not forgotten that Spanish artistic production runs parallel to a wealth of literary creations and that both share the dream of the renewal of those languages (Ramón Gómez de la Serna). What has also been proved is that cultural transfers with the European avant-garde can be done with the help of spaces such as the Dalmau Gallery in Barcelona or the Residencia de Estudiantes in Madrid, as well as the organisation of artists in associations and the opening of exhibitions, such as Artistas Ibéricos (1925) or Exposición Logicofobista (1936). As the century progresses, the presence of artists in centres of European artistic activity is increasing (the so-called School of Paris is established), which means there is a greater access to new sources: manifestos, modern art magazines (Cahiers d'Art) and artistic and scientific literature, which can contribute decisively in shaping new languages (new objectivity, realism of regionalistic inheritance, surrealism, a turn to primitivistic and anti-artistic principles or realism as a vocabulary for an artistic-political commitment).