Juan Martinez

JUAN MARTÍNEZ (Navas de San Juan, Jaén, 1942).
"Portrait in black with gauze.
Blood and pastel on black paper. Mixed media on textile.
It has damage in the frame.
Presents label of the Juana Mordó Gallery (Madrid).
Measurements. 160 x 150 cm; 165 x 155 cm (frame).
Juan Martínez was born in Navas de San Juan (Jaén) in 1942. As a child he left the Andalusian olive groves and moved with his family to Catalonia, studied architecture in Barcelona but ended up in Searclens (Switzerland) focusing on painting. He himself says he feels like a son of uprooting. He grew up artistically in Central Europe and, in fact, is better known in Switzerland and Germany than in his homeland, where he occasionally lands with his work, because he resists being a foreigner in his own land. Since his first exhibition in Geneva in 1967, his work has been present in important museums of modern painting: Beaux-Arts (Geneva), Contemporary Art (Madrid), Guggenheim (New York), Budapest, Pittsburg (Pennsylvania), etc., as well as in important European and American galleries.