LUIS MARSANS JULIÀ (Barcelona, 1930).
"Theatrical scene".
Gouache on paper.
Signed in the lower right corner.
Size: 26 x 33 cm; 38 x 45,5 cm (frame).
A watercolourist and painter, Luis Marsans is mainly known for his series centred on the world of Marcel Proust, entitled "A la recerca del temps perdut", and since 1980 he has regularly shown his work at the Claude Bernard gallery in Paris. In fact, he spent part of his childhood in Paris because of the war, and did not return to Barcelona with his family until 1940. In 1947 he travelled to Mexico and the United States, and in New York he met Salvador Dalí through his mutual friend Ismael Smith. He then discovered contemporary art and decided to devote himself to painting, and on his return to Barcelona in 1948 he began his training in the studio of Ramón Rogent. He also came into contact with Dau al Set under the guidance of Joan Ponç. During this period Marsans became interested in the Bauhaus, and travelled to France to meet its founder, Walter Gropius. On this trip he visited an exhibition of Cézanne, which radically changed his work. In 1950 he left Rogent's studio and continued his technical and aesthetic research on his own. In this decade he met Duchamp in Cadaqués, and this encounter determined his identification with a new plastic language. Thus, at the beginning of 1960 he began to integrate figuration and abstraction in his work. After devoting several years to his series on Proust, Marsans finally decided to present his work to the public, making his individual debut at the Trece gallery in Barcelona in 1972. The following year his language took another turn and Marsans returned to figuration, without renouncing the conceptual content of his work. In 1982 he had a solo exhibition at the Balzac Museum in Paris, and since then he has had many important exhibitions both in Spain and abroad: Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden in Washington D.C. (1985), Centro de Exposiciones y Congresos in Zaragoza (1989), Palau de la Virreina in Barcelona (1995), Leandro Navarro Gallery in Madrid (1997) and Artur Ramon Gallery in Barcelona (1997).