Antoni Pitxot

ANTONI PITXOT SOLER (Figueras, Girona, 1934).
Untitled, 1994.
Oil on cardboard.
Signed and dated.
Measurements: 27,5 x 20 cm; 38 x 31 cm (frame).
Nephew of the also painter Ramon Pichot, Antoni Pichot or Pitxot lives with his family in San Sebastian from 1946 to 1964. There he began his training with the drawing teacher Juan Núñez Fernández, who had also been Dalí's teacher years before in Figueras. In the fifties he began his career within a realism of expressionist roots, making himself known through various exhibitions in San Sebastian, Barcelona, Madrid, Bilbao and Lisbon. In 1964 he settled permanently in the family home in Cadaqués. During this period his work underwent a decisive change, as Pichot turned his attention to the study of objects in his environment. This will lead him to use the stones of Cadaqués, from which he creates anamorphic, anthropomorphic and allegorical visions, with which he connects with an undercurrent of western painting that goes from certain masters of Italian mannerism to surrealism. It was also during these years that he began his relationship with Salvador Dalí, with whom he would become close friends. The great surrealist master will be his protector from then on, and in 1972 he proposes him to install a permanent exhibition of his work in the Dalí Theater-Museum in Figueras, inaugurated two years later. In 1975, in collaboration with Salvador Dalí, he created the four "grotesque monsters" for the inner courtyard of the Theatre-Museum. A great communication and aesthetic complicity was established between Pichot and Dalí. Thus, for example, in 1958 Pichot worked on the exhibition "The Battle of Constantí", which he presented in Barcelona. The theme of the battle was inspired by a conversation with Dalí, who explained to him that the rocks on the beach of Sa Conca in Cadaqués already form in themselves multiple battles. Pichot is currently the director of the Dalí Theatre-Museum, as well as life patron and second vice-president of the Gala-Salvador Dalí Foundation. In 2004 he received the Gold Medal for Merit in the Fine Arts.