Joan Josep Tharrats

JOAN JOSEP THARRATS VIDAL (Girona, 1918 – Barcelona, 2001).
“Dau al Set,” 1950.
Watercolor on paper.
Signed in ink.
With a label from the exhibition “Automatismos Paralelos” at the Grupo Atlántico de Arte Moderno on the reverse.
Measurements: 50 x 70 cm.

After beginning his training in Béziers (France), Tharrats returned to Barcelona in 1935 and enrolled at the Massana School. He began his artistic career after the Civil War, in a style that evolved from an initial Impressionist approach toward a progressive abstraction, influenced by Mondrian and Kandinsky. A co-founder of Dau al Set alongside Brossa, Ponç, Cuixart, and Tàpies, Tharrats held his first solo exhibition in 1949 at the El Jardín galleries in Barcelona. Beginning in 1954, he exhibited regularly at the Sala Gaspar in Barcelona, as well as in Stockholm and New York in 1955, at the São Paulo Biennial in 1959, and at the Venice Biennales in 1960 and 1964. In 1955, following the dissolution of Dau al Set, he helped found the Taüll group alongside Muxart, Guinovart, and his former colleagues Cuixart and Tàpies. Eleven years later, in 1966, he also co-founded the Association of Contemporary Artists. A pioneer of the postwar Catalan avant-garde, Tharrats evolved from a surrealist-influenced linear abstraction during his time with Dau al Set toward an informalist style characterized by rich texture, abundant color, and free brushwork. In addition to easel painting, he developed his own version of printmaking techniques (“maculaturas”) and also created posters, book illustrations, murals, stained-glass windows, mosaics, jewelry, and opera set designs. In 1983, he was awarded the Cross of Sant Jordi, and in 1994, the National Prize for the Visual Arts. That same year, he was elected to the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Sant Jordi. His work is featured in various museums and collections around the world, including MoMA and the Guggenheim in New York, the Tate Gallery in London, MACBA, and the Reina Sofía Museum in Madrid.