Bigas Luna

BIGAS LUNA (Barcelona, 1946 – La Riera de Gaià, Tarragona, 2013).
Untitled. 1999.
Collage and mixed media on paper.
Signed and dated on the reverse.
Measurements: 21 x 10 cm; 29 x 18.5 cm (frame).

This work belongs to a particularly significant period in Bigas Luna’s artistic production, when the artist began to more actively showcase an artistic practice he had maintained alongside his renowned film career. That same year, he presented *Cares de l’ànima* at the Galería Metropolitana in Barcelona—a collection of nearly seven hundred small collages—alongside the series *Anfang* and *Allatrice*. That exhibition highlighted his interest in small formats, the layering of materials, and the incorporation of heterogeneous elements—paper, stains, fragments, and materials from nature—as vehicles for immediate and intimate expression.

This composition fits squarely within that experimental context. On the bare surface of the paper, Bigas Luna focuses his intervention on a vertical structure built from translucent layers, torn paper, dark stains, and small added elements, exploiting the contrast between the fragility of the materials and the visual density of the blacks and earth tones. The work is constructed through accumulation, juxtaposition, and chance—procedures closely tied to his interest in found objects and in the transformations that materials introduce into the creative process. The retrospective held at Can Framis in 2015 specifically featured works from 1999, including *Anfang*, confirming the importance of these explorations within his visual art practice.

Before establishing himself as a filmmaker, Bigas Luna trained at Eina and Elisava and worked in design, conceptual art, and video; he was also a co-founder of Estudi Gris, which was awarded the Delta de Oro in 1970. He achieved international recognition as a director with films such as *Jamón, jamón* (1992) and *La teta y la luna* (1994), but he never abandoned his artistic practice, which he viewed as closely intertwined with his cinematic universe. His visual art was the subject of the retrospective *Més de Bigas i més de Luna* at the Museu Can Framis of the Fundació Vila Casas in 2015, an institution that holds works by the artist in its collection.