Francisco Farreras
Francisco Farreras
(1927 – 2021)
Pintura N*3, abstract composition
Oil on canvas
Signed, titled and dated on the reverse 1957
Spain
Exhibition
XXIX Venice Biennale, 1958
Height 110 cm
Width 210 cm
Francisco Farreras moved to Murcia with his family in 1940, where he began his artistic journey under Antonio Gómez Cano. A year later, he moved to Santa Cruz de Tenerife to study at the School of Arts and Crafts under Mariano de Cossío. In 1943, he relocated to Madrid to join the San Fernando School of Fine Arts, studying with Daniel Vázquez Díaz and Ramón Stolz. His first solo exhibition was in 1952 at the Biosca Gallery in Madrid. A scholarship from the French Institute took him to Paris in 1953-1954, leading to numerous exhibitions, including the Venice Biennales of 1958 and 1960, MOMA in 1960, and the Tate Gallery in 1962.
In 1963, Farreras moved to New York, creating a mural-collage for the Spanish Pavilion at the New York World’s Fair and working with the Bertha Schaefer Gallery and the Juana Mordó Gallery. He returned to Madrid in 1966. His work is featured in collections such as Reina Sofia Museum (Madrid) Fundación Juan March, Atheneum Museum (Helsinki), Musée National d’Art Moderne (Paris), The Museum of Modern Art (New York), The National Museum of Modern Art (Tokyo), and The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (New York).
Farreras’ art evolved from geometric figurative painting influenced by Cubism to geometric abstraction and then Informalism. In the late 1950s and 1960s, he explored tissue paper combined with various paints, favoring collage techniques. His palette lightened in the late 1960s, incorporating figurative elements. In the 1970s, he expanded the size of his works, and in 1982, he created a mural-collage at Madrid-Barajas Airport, marking a shift to volumetric works called “coudrages.” From 1988, he focused exclusively on wooden reliefs using salvaged materials, and around 2004, he began working on nearly flat surfaces with new materials, displaying a synthetic intention.
  
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