Leopoldo Nóvoa García (born December 17, 1919 - February 23, 2012) was a

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many countries in the Americas **Spanish cuisine **Spanish history **Spanish culture ...

Uruguay Uruguay, officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay, is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast, while bordering the Río de la Plata to the south and the A ...

painter Painting is a Visual arts, visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called "matrix" or "Support (art), support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with ...

and

sculptor Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

Life

Mural del artista Leopoldo Novoa Vista Centrica

Nóvoa Garcia was born in 1919, to a Galician mother and

Uruguayan Uruguayans () are people identified with the country of Uruguay, through citizenship or descent. Uruguay is home to people of different ethnic origins. As a result, many Uruguayans do not equate their nationality with ethnicity, but with citizen ...

father. In 1938, he emigrated to Uruguay, where he met

Joaquín Torres-García Joaquín Torres-García (28 July 1874 – 8 August 1949) was a prominent Uruguayan-Spanish artist, theorist, and author, renowned for his international impact on modern art. Born in Montevideo, Uruguay, he moved with his family to Catalonia, Spa ...

. He spent his early years in Uruguay in

Montevideo Montevideo (, ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Uruguay, largest city of Uruguay. According to the 2023 census, the city proper has a population of 1,302,954 (about 37.2% of the country's total population) in an area of . M ...

, where he founded Apex, a culture-focused magazine, with

Carlos Maggi Carlos Maggi (5 August 1922, Montevideo, Uruguay – 15 May 2015, Montevideo, Uruguay) was a Uruguayan lawyer, playwright, journalist and writer. Among his acquaintances he was known as "the Kid" (). He was one of the last surviving members of ...

and other Uruguayan artists and

intellectual An intellectual is a person who engages in critical thinking, research, and Human self-reflection, reflection about the nature of reality, especially the nature of society and proposed solutions for its normative problems. Coming from the wor ...

s. Artists like Joaquín Torres García,

Juan Carlos Onetti Juan Carlos Onetti Borges (July 1, 1909 – May 30, 1994) was a Uruguayan novelist and author of short stories. Early life Onetti was born in Montevideo, Uruguay. He was the son of Carlos Onetti, a customs official, and Honoria Borges, who be ...

Juana de Ibarbourou Juana Fernández Morales de Ibarbourou, also known as Juana de América, (March 8, 1892 – July 15, 1979) was a Uruguayan poet and one of the most popular writers of Spanish America. Her poetry, the earliest of which is often highly erotic, is ...

Julio María Sanguinetti Julio María Sanguinetti Coirolo (; born 6 January 1936) often known by his initials JMS, is a Uruguayan former lawyer, journalist and politician of the Colorado Party (Uruguay), Colorado Party (PC) who served as the President of Uruguay as the ...

, and Marta Canessa worked on the magazine and formed a close friendship with

Jorge Oteiza Jorge Oteiza (October 21, 1908 – April 9, 2003), was a Basques, Basque Spain, Spanish sculpture, sculptor, painting, painter, designer and writing, writer from the Basque Country (greater region), Basque Country, renowned for being one of th ...

. In

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires, controlled by the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Argentina. It is located on the southwest of the Río de la Plata. Buenos Aires is classified as an Alpha− glob ...

, where Nóvoa Garcia lived from 1948 to 1957, he became close friends with

Lucio Fontana Lucio Fontana (; 19 February 1899 – 7 September 1968) was an Italian Argentines, Argentine-Italian painter, sculptor, and theorist. He is known as the founder of Spatialism and exponent of Abstract art, abstract painting as the f ...

, who greatly influenced his work. Nóvoa Garcia was heavily influenced by other Galicians exiled by the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

such as

Rafael Dieste Rafael Dieste ( Rianxo, 1899–Santiago de Compostela, 1981) was a Galician poet, philosopher, short-story writer, and dramatist writing mostly in Galician language, but also in Spanish language. He began to write with the encouragement of anothe ...

and

Luís Seoane Luis Seoane (1910–1979) was a lithographer and artist. Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on June 1, 1910, of Galician immigrants, he spent much of his childhood and youth in Galicia (Spain). He was educated in A Coruña. His first exhibition w ...

. After 1957, he came to settle in Montevideo, where he would remain for eight years. In 1965, Nóvoa Garcia moved to

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

at Michel Tapié's suggestion. Tapié had been impressed by Nóvoa Garcia's giant mural at the

Estadio Luis Tróccoli Estadio Luis Tróccoli is a multi-use stadium in Montevideo, Uruguay. It is currently used primarily for football matches and is the home of CA Cerro. The stadium holds 25,000 spectators and was built in 1964. Installations The outside of th ...

in Montevideo. In Paris, Nóvoa Garcia impressed

Julio Cortázar Julio Florencio Cortázar (26 August 1914 – 12 February 1984; ) was an Argentine and naturalised French novelist, short story writer, poet, essayist, and translator. Known as one of the founders of the Latin American Boom, Cortázar influenc ...

, who wrote a story about his work, and

Orlando Pelayo Orlando commonly refers to: * Orlando, Florida, a city in the United States Orlando may also refer to: People * Orlando (given name), a masculine name, includes a list of people with the name * Orlando (surname), includes a list of people with ...

. In 1974, Nóvoa Garcia had his first solo exposition at the Edouard Loeb Gallery, which would remain his gallery for many years. Nóvoa Garcia remained active until his death in 2012, regularly working from his native Galicia.

Works

Nóvoa Garcia's paintings, murals, and

pyrography Pyrography or pyrogravure is the free handed art of decorating wood or other materials with burn marks resulting from the controlled application of a heated object such as a Fireplace poker, poker. It is also known as pokerwork or wood burning. ...

spanned a wide array of subjects. Many of his works focused on

landscapes A landscape is the visible features of an area of land, its landforms, and how they integrate with natural or human-made features, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal.''New Oxford American Dictionary''. A landscape includes the ...

from his time in Galicia. Even so, his work was often abstract, with hints of

abstract expressionism Abstract expressionism in the United States emerged as a distinct art movement in the aftermath of World War II and gained mainstream acceptance in the 1950s, a shift from the American social realism of the 1930s influenced by the Great Depressi ...

and

informalism Informalism or Art Informel () is a pictorial movement from the 1943–1950s, that includes all the abstract and gestural tendencies that developed in France and the rest of Europe during the World War II, similar to American abstract express ...

, even though he did not belong to any one

artistic movement An art movement is a tendency or style in art with a specific art philosophy or goal, followed by a group of artists during a specific period of time, (usually a few months, years or decades) or, at least, with the heyday of the movement defined ...

. He often worked with impersonal forms, juxtaposed rhythms, and imposing material, described by Raul Zaffaroni s "urgent painting" in 196

Honors

Castelao Medal The Castelao Medal (Galician: ''Medalla Castelao''), established in 1984, is one of the highest civil distinctions awarded in Galicia, surpassed only by the Medalla de Galicia. The award is presented by the Xunta de Galicia to honour the people ...

, 1993 * City of Pontevedra Prize, 1997 * Galician Critics' Prize, 2002

References

{{Authority control 20th-century Uruguayan sculptors 21st-century Uruguayan sculptors Uruguayan abstract sculptors Artists from Montevideo Uruguayan muralists 1919 births 2012 deaths