OSWALDO GUAYASAMÃN (Quito, Ecuador, 1919 - Baltimore, USA, 1999).
"Bull and condor".
Mixed media on paper.
Signed in the lower right corner.
Size: 20 x 12 cm; 32 x 24 cm (frame).
One of the greatest names in Ecuadorian painting, Oswaldo Guayasamín showed artistic talent even in his childhood, and even sold some paintings in the Plaza de la Independencia in his native Quito in his early years. Despite his father's opposition, he enrolled at the School of Fine Arts in the Ecuadorian capital to study painting and sculpture at the height of the so-called Four Days' War. In 1941 he was awarded a degree and first prize at the Mariano Aguilera Salon in Quito, and the following year he held his first solo exhibition at the age of twenty-three. Between the end of 1942 and the beginning of 1943 Guayasamín was in the United States, and later travelled to Mexico, where he began to work as Orozco's assistant. He then made a series of trips around Latin America, always finding the same situation of oppression of the indigenous society, to which he himself belonged. From then on this would be a constant theme in his work. In his youth Guayasamín won all the National Prizes in his country, and at the age of thirty-six he won the Grand Prize at the III Bienal Hispanoamericana de Arte, held in 1955 in Barcelona. Later he also won the same award at the São Paulo Biennial (1957). Throughout his career, this master exhibited his work individually not only in various Latin American countries, but also in many European countries, the Soviet Union, China and the United States. In addition to easel painting, he painted murals, sculptures and monuments, which are now present in Latin America and Europe. In 1971 Guayasamín was appointed president of the Casa de la Cultura Ecuatoriana, in 1978 a member of the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Madrid, and a year later an honorary member of the Italian Academy of Arts. His work is now widely represented in the Foundation he created in Quito, as well as in leading international art galleries and private collections.