Maruja Mallo

Maruja Mallo emerged as a pivotal figure within the Generation of 1927, an eclectic collective of Spanish avant-garde artists that featured luminaries such as Salvador Dalí, Federico García Lorca, Luis Buñuel, and the Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset.

Biography of Maruja Mallo

Maruja Mallo was born in 1902 in Viveiro, Spain. In her youth, she split her time between her parents' home and her aunt and uncle's residence. During her stay with her aunt and uncle, her artistic inspiration began to flourish, motivating her to express her creativity through her artwork. The family later relocated to Avilés in 1913, where they remained until 1922.

Later, her family moved to Madrid. In the dynamic artistic atmosphere of the Spanish capital, Maruja Mallo embarked on her educational voyage at the San Fernando Royal Academy of Fine Arts, a path she pursued until 1926. During her stay in Madrid, she encountered numerous influential figures from the Spanish Generation of '27. Furthermore, she played a leading role in forming a group of women associated with the Generation of '27, renowned as "Las Sinsombrero."

Throughout the 1920s, Mallo also actively contributed to numerous literary publications and authored several books.

Maruja Mallo's artistic style took on a more surrealistic essence during the early 1930s. Her debut exhibition in Paris occurred at the Pierre Loeb Gallery in 1932.

Following that, in 1933, she came back to Madrid and wholeheartedly participated in the Society of Iberian Artists. In that very year, her dedication to the Second Spanish Republic prompted her to assume the position of a drawing professor at the Institute of Arévalo, the School Institute of Madrid, and the Ceramics School of Madrid.

With the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, Maruja Mallo sought refuge in Argentina. Unfortunately, during her exile, her male collaborators in the Spanish Avant-Garde Art, Vanguardist movements, and Surrealist events distanced themselves from her. This unfortunate development resulted in her exclusion from the records of Spanish Avant-Garde history. Until recently, Mallo's presence was notably absent from Spanish texts on art and cultural history.

In 1939, she embarked on a journey to Santiago, Chile, where she received invitations to deliver lectures at various conferences. In 1945, her travels took her to Chile, where she explored the landscapes of Viña del Mar and the captivating Easter Island, accompanied by Pablo Neruda.

On the 11th of October, 1948, Maruja Mallo bid farewell to Argentina and relocated to New York. It wasn't until 1962, a quarter of a century later, that she made her triumphant return to Spain, journeying from New York to Madrid.

In 1990, she received the prestigious Gold Medal of Madrid, and in 1991, she was honored with the Gold Medal of the Xunta de Galicia.

Maruja Mallo peacefully passed away in Madrid at 93 years old. 

Maruja Mallo's Art Style

Maruja Mallo's paintings skillfully juxtapose statuesque figures within abstract, intricately textured landscapes, effectively capturing the vibrant and joyous tumult of 20th-century Spanish culture. In her condensed yet tumultuous urban portraits, Mallo presents a world turned upside down. The artist adeptly weaves improbable encounters among diverse individuals and traditions, thereby transforming urban settings into arenas of rebellion, where conventional distinctions of gender, class, and "low" and "high" culture are cleverly satirized and concealed.

Following her encounter with the Uruguayan painter and theorist Joaquín Torres-García in 1933, Maruja Mallo's initial Surrealist tendencies fused with a deepened fascination for mathematics, structure, and abstraction. This transformative artistic evolution, firmly rooted in her commitment to local observations, is vividly illustrated by her growing emphasis on compositional precision and the balanced distribution of forms.

Notably, some of her most iconic works, such as "Arquitectura Humana / El Pescador" (1937) and "La Red" (1939), were born from a rich dialogue with Torres-García's advanced principles of artistic construction.