JOSÉ GUERRERO

He studies in the School of Arts and Crafts in Granada and very soon goes to Madrid to study in the Superior School of Fine Arts of San Fernando where his teacher is Daniel Vazquez Diaz.

In 1942 he wins a scholarship of the Casa de Velazquez and three years later a scholarship of the French government after which he transfers to Paris. There he gets to know in situ the European vanguard and above all he familiarizes himself with the work of the Spanish painters who belong to the Paris School. From that time on his work is marked by the touches of the vanguard and signs of Picasso which he abandons in the first years of the fifties when he discovers the abstract expressionism in New York. Settled down in this city in 1950 he collaborates with the Gallery of Betty Parssons and already in 1954 his paintings are on exhibition next to those of Joan Miro in the Art Club of Chicago. This exhibition signified an international appreciation of Jose Guerrero. The aesthetic of his work influenced by the abstract expressionism of Rothko and faction painting of Kline changes completely. Jose Guerrero creates compositions where he foregrounds the vital interaction of the space, colours, and unrecognizable objects.

In 1965 when he comes back to Spain his works get more public attention. He participates in the foundation of the Museum of Cuenca. In 1966 he makes one of his best-known compositions La Brecha de Viznar, inspired by the works of Federico Garcia Lorca. Soon after that he returns to New York although he continues travelling to Spain. He goes on painting and the combinations of different colours, plans and lines that sometimes are influenced by Clyfford Still and Barnett Newman are highlighted.