Lecture by Carmen Fernández Aparicio on the occasion of the exhibition “Julio González and the Avant-gardes”

Lecture Julio González y la abstracción de los años 30 by Carmen Fernández Aparicio.

The exhibition places the works of Julio González (Barcelona, 1876 – Paris, 1942) right at the centre of the aesthetic, political and social debate of his time, seeking to generate a discourse in which all such aspects come together using the artwork and documents that the IVAM has about him and other Avant-garde artists. The project is also intended to approach the artistic and cultural reality of the metropolises where he developed his creative work: Barcelona and Paris.

The exhibition highlights some key moments in his career such as his training in the Catalonian Modernist circle and the relationship with his brother Joan; his friendship with Joaquín Torres-García (Montevideo, Uruguay, 1879-1949) and the contact made with some Cercle et Carré artists, his participation in the Pavilion of the Republic in the 1937 Paris International Exhibition, and the innovative nature of his sculpture starting with his Woman with a mirror (1937).