José María Yturralde

(Cuenca, 1942)

Author's artworks

20th-21st Century. Spanish

Born in Cuenca in 1942, José María Yturralde trained at the School of Fine Arts of Valencia, where he obtained a PhD. He currently combines his art practice with his teaching as Painting Professor at the Faculty of Fine Arts in the same city.

Since his early steps as an artist, Yturralde has been known for his ongoing research with manifold media and techniques, with highly varied aesthetic results. His engagement with the language of
in the 1960s foreshadowed the weight mathematics would have throughout his production. This period was punctuated by a number of important events that would mark his future practice: in 1966 he collaborated as curator at the Museo de Arte Abstracto Español in Cuenca; in 1967 he was actively involved in the creation of the
group; and a year later he would be granted a scholarship to join the Automatic Generation of Visual Forms seminar at CCUM (Calculus Centre, University of Madrid). There he carried out his earliest experiments with computers, which lead to a number of works based on optical perceptions and false perspectives. As a result of this experience he had his first show, Formas computables, in 1969.

In 1975, thanks to a grant from Fundación Juan March, he was able to move temporarily to Massachusetts to further his studies at the Center for Advanced Visual Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). This period would prove key for his research into the relationship between technology and art, and his experimentation with multidimensional geometry; it had also a strong impact on his floating sculptures, or “flying structures” as they were known, which went on display at the 1978 Venice Biennale. As from 1980, his creations have been gradually evolving and transforming as a result of his tireless conceptual and aesthetic exploration. In that regard, after a return to constructivist two-dimensionality in the 1980s, around the 1990s his gaze became more poetic and thoughtful, resulting in works which he managed to endow with a metaphysical aura through a refined treatment of light and colour.

His paintings and installations have been seen in exhibitions and events in Spain and abroad, like the São Paulo (1967) and Mercosul (Porto Alegre, Brazil, 1999) biennials. They are also in the holdings of major institutions, including, among others, the Museo de Arte Abstracto Español, Cuenca; Museo Patio Herreriano, Valladolid; and Fundació Pilar i Joan Miró, Palma de Mallorca.

Yturralde is a member of the San Carlos Royal Academy of Arts of Valencia and in 2020 he won Spain’s National Visual Arts Prize for his life’s work.