Manolo Valdés

MANOLO VALDÉS (Valencia, 1942).
“Don Juan #4,” 2007.
Etching, drypoint, and resin. Copy VI/XII.
Signed and numbered in pencil.
Measurements: 75 x 56 cm.
Don Juan #4 is part of the renowned print series in which Manolo Valdés reinterprets one of the most enduring archetypes of Western culture: the myth of Don Juan. In the hands of the Valencian artist, this figure ceases to be merely a literary character and becomes a recurring visual motif, undergoing a process of formal transformation that places it between the historical memory of art and the contemporary world.
The work is part of Valdés’s exploration of the appropriation and reinterpretation of images drawn from the artistic and literary tradition. In this case, the myth of Don Juan—popularized through texts such as those by Tirso de Molina and later reinterpreted by authors such as Molière and other European playwrights—becomes a pretext for exploring issues such as identity, seduction, the mask, and the construction of the character as a cultural symbol. Far from a literal narrative, Valdés reduces the figure to an essential presence, where the recognizable coexists with abstraction and formal simplification.
The language of the engraving is characterized by an economy of resources and a strong expressive power, in which the figure emerges as a silhouette or visual imprint rather than as a descriptive representation. This formal refinement is consistent with the artist’s career trajectory; since his time with the Equipo Crónica collective, he has consistently shown an interest in the dialogue between art history, popular culture, and the image as a symbolic construction.
The character of Don Juan, in this series, functions as a contemporary “double”: an archetype that has spanned centuries of representation and which Valdés reinterprets from a contemporary perspective, distancing it from the theatrical narrative to situate it in the realm of the autonomous image.
This series connects with the artist’s other explorations centered on iconic figures from universal culture, such as his reinterpretations of historical queens, monumental heads, and literary characters, which appear in his sculptural and graphic work and in international collections such as the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, and the Tate. In all of these works, Valdés explores the idea of the image as cultural memory, where the grand narratives of the past are reactivated through a contemporary lens.