José Caballero

JOSÉ CABALLERO (Huelva, 1915 - Madrid, 1991).
Untitled.
Mixed media on canvas.
Signed in the lower right corner.
Measurements: 71 x 71 cm; 98 x 98 cm (frame).
José Caballero was formed in the School of Fine Arts of San Fernando and in the study of Daniel Vázquez Díaz, where he consolidated a solid academic base that later he knew how to combine with the vanguards of his time. In 1935, Federico García Lorca incorporated him into the University Theater "La Barraca", where Caballero contributed drawings for the company's plays and designed, at the Residencia de Estudiantes, the sets for "Historia de un soldado". That same year marked a creative period deeply linked to Spanish surrealism, in which he collaborated with Adriano del Valle on three posters for the Seville Athenaeum and illustrated poems by García Lorca and Pablo Neruda. He also participated in avant-garde magazines such as Cruz y Raya, Noroeste y Línea and Caballo Verde for poetry, and was part of the First Drawing Fair of the Iberian Society of Artists.
His work began to receive wide recognition in 1949, thanks to his work for the Spanish Tourist Office and his illustrations for poetry books. The following year he was invited to the Venice Biennale and held his first major solo exhibition in Madrid, at the Clan gallery. During the 1950s, Caballero delved deeper into expressionism, exhibiting in 1953 at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Madrid.
Throughout his career he received important recognitions, among them the National Prize of Plastic Arts and the Medal of Artistic Merit of the City Council of Madrid. His work is part of outstanding national and international collections, such as the Reina Sofía Museum in Madrid, the Patio Herreriano in Valladolid, the Mapfre, Telefónica and Juan March Foundations, the Chase Manhattan Bank Collection in New York, the Rufino Tamayo Museum in Mexico, the Museum of the Center for Aesthetic Research in Turin, the National Gallery of Foreign Art in Sofia and the Texas Memorial Museum, among other renowned institutions.