Rafael Canogar

RAFAEL CANOGAR (Toledo, 1935).
"Head Nº3", from the folder Homage to Fray Bartolomé de las Casas, 1984.
Etching on paper. Exemplary P.A. Current print run of 100 copies.
Work reproduced in the catalogue raisonné of the artist (online).
Publisher: National Commission of the V Centenary.
Printer: Taller Mayor 28, Madrid.
Measurements: 51 x 35 cm; 78 x 65 cm (frame).
Cabeza Nº3", is a work belonging to the folder Homage to Fray Bartolomé de las Casas (1984). The composition evidences Canogar's characteristic plastic language, where the human figure appears synthesized through energetic gestures, masses of great graphic power and an expressiveness close to informalism and the new figuration. The head, turned into a symbol of identity, suffering and memory, acquires a strong emotional and ethical charge, in consonance with the humanist spirit of the editorial project to which it belongs.
The folder was conceived on the occasion of the V Centenary of the Discovery of America and to commemorate the 500th anniversary of the birth of Fray Bartolomé de las Casas. Under the framework of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, it gathered graphic works by some of the most relevant artists of the international panorama of the 20th century, among them Rufino Tamayo, Roberto Matta, Antoni Clavé, José Guerrero, Robert Motherwell, Antoni Tàpies, Eduardo Chillida, Julio Le Parc and Antonio Saura. The importance of this edition is further endorsed by the presence of a copy, number 62/100, in the collection of the Pompidou Museum (No. 2-1738), an essential reference of modern and contemporary international art.