FRANCISCO MATTO (Montevideo, 1911-1995). "Convent of Santa Buenaventura, Rome", 1974. Oil on cardboard. Signed and dated in the upper left margin. Titled on the back. With label on the back of the Sala Monzón. Measurements: 25,5 x 27,5 cm; 42,5 x 44,5 cm (frame). Although Francisco Matto was a self-taught painter, he was able to nourish himself with the aesthetics of the European avant-garde artists thanks to the study and reading of foreign publications that arrived in Montevideo. At first he worked in a language close to Classical Antiquity and pre-Columbian art. In April 1934 Joaquín Torres García arrived in Montevideo and founded Estudio 1037, which in 1935 became the Asociación de Arte Constructivo, where a large number of Uruguayan artists of the time were trained. At that time Matto was already linked to the Montevideo art world (he knew Pesce Castro, José Luís Zorrilla de San Martín, Susana Soca and the architect Ernesto Leborgne). He came into contact with Torres García and at the beginning of 1943 the Taller Torres García was created, where Matto became one of its founders together with the brothers Edgardo and Alceu Ribeiro, Augusto and Horacio Torres, among other artists. From that year onwards he took part in almost all the exhibitions held by the Taller. This was the beginning of his international leap. Francisco Matto travelled extensively throughout his life (South America, Europe, New York). His work is currently held by MoMA, New York, the Museo de Arte del Banco de la República, Bogotá, the Museo de Bellas Artes, Caracas, the Museo Nacional de Artes Visuales, Montevideo, The Phoebus Foundation Collection, Antwerp, the Blanton Museum of Art, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, among others.