ARTURO SOUTO FEIJOO (Pontevedra, 1902 - Mexico City, 1964). "Interior scene with characters". Watercolour on paper. Size: 46 x 62 cm; 64 x 80 cm (frame). The son and disciple of the painter Alfredo Souto, Arturo lived in his youth between Oviedo, Zaragoza, Lugo and La Coruña, until he settled in Seville, where he studied at the Industrial School of Arts and Crafts and Fine Arts between 1916 and 1920. Following his parents' instructions, he decided to study to become a quantity surveyor once again in Galicia, where the rural and maritime environments would have a decisive influence on Souto's initial artistic vision. In 1922, determined to devote himself to painting, he settled in Madrid and entered the San Fernando Royal Academy of Fine Arts, where he coincided with Salvador Dalí and other renowned artists. A fan of social gatherings, he spent time with writers and intellectuals, and became friends with Valle Inclán. The year after his arrival in Madrid, in 1923, he married Carmen Alabarce. In 1925 he held his first individual exhibition. That same year he took part in the Manifiesto de los Ibéricos, with a group of non-conformists who were against the official art of Spain at the time. With them he held an exhibition at the Palacio del Retiro which was a real revolution. During these years Souto lived on his father's pension and on what he earned from decorating porcelain, and in 1926 he managed to raise enough money to make his first trip to Paris. In 1931 he returned to the city on the Seine, this time thanks to a grant from the Diputación de Pontevedra. Enthusiastic about the new aesthetic trends he discovered in Paris, he worked intensely and became interested in Giorgio de Chirico, who had a great influence on his work. Once in Spain, he took part in important group exhibitions and held exhibitions in Madrid (from 1928), Pontevedra (1928), Santiago de Compostela (1930), La Coruña (1931), Vigo (1932) and other places. During these years he experimented with various techniques and developed a work marked by a certain decadence. In 1931 he visited several European museums thanks to a new grant from the Diputación, and in Madrid he signed the manifesto of the Agrupación Gremial de Artistas Plásticos. His exhibitions followed one after the other all over Spain, and he made the international leap, showing his work in Copenhagen and Berlin. In 1934 he was granted a scholarship to the Spanish Academy in Rome, where he remained until 1936. On his return to Spain he was surprised by the National Uprising, and joined the Republican side, devoting himself to propaganda work with drawings and posters. In 1937 he took part in the International Exhibition in Paris, in the pavilion designed by Sert, which included Picasso's "Guernica". After the war he went into exile, first in Bordeaux and then in Havana. He visited the United States and finally settled in Mexico in 1942. In 1962 he returned to Spain, where he held a number of exhibitions, although he finally died in Mexico in 1964, where he had travelled to liquidate his interests in the city in order to settle permanently in Spain. He is currently represented in the NovaCaixaGalicia Collection, the Museum of Pontevedra and other collections, both public and private.