Juan Genovés

JUAN GENOVÉS (Valencia, 1930 - Madrid, 2020)
"The transparent mirrors", 2004.
Acrylic on canvas adhered to board.
Signed" and dated lower right corner.
Attached certificate of authenticity issued by the artist.
Provenance: Marlborough Gallery, Madrid ;Private collection, Spain.
Exhibitions: Madrid, Marlborough Gallery, Genovés. Recent work, 2005 (illustrated in catalog no. 3, p. 9).
Measurements: 122 x 145 cm.

Juan Genovés' work has been marked by a constant reflection on the relationship between the individual and the collective. In his first decades, his black and white compositions, which emerged under Franco's repression, turned the anonymous crowd into a powerful symbol of surveillance, tension and isolation.
From the 2000s onwards, Genovés profoundly renewed his plastic language by incorporating color, greater spatial complexity and an increasing individualization of his figures, without abandoning his characteristic interest in the collective. In this context, Los espejos transparentes occupies a particularly significant place within his production, as it masterfully synthesizes both stages: it preserves the structural tension and compositional dynamism of his most emblematic works, while introducing the chromatic vibration and visual openness characteristic of his maturity. The fragmentation of space into successive planes and the luminous lines that duplicate and prolong the figures generate an almost cinematographic effect, where movement, reflection and memory converge. Thus, the work is presented as a key piece in the evolution of Genovés: a bridge between the political density of his beginnings and the renewed formal freedom of his last stage.

Juan Genovés was a key figure in contemporary Spanish art, internationally recognized for his compositions of crowds as a reflection on freedom, repression and the relationship between the individual and society. Trained in Valencia, he developed a body of work deeply linked to the political context of Franco's Spain, evolving from his iconic black and white crowd scenes to a more open and chromatic language in his maturity.
He exhibited widely in Spain, Europe and the United States, received the National Plastic Arts Award in 1984, and his work is part of important museums and collections such as the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, the IVAM, the Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao and prominent international collections. His emblematic piece El Abrazo (The Embrace) became a symbol of the Spanish democratic transition. Los espejos transparentes belongs to this mature stage and synthesizes in an exemplary way the evolution of his language, becoming a particularly representative work within his production.