149 - ANTÓN ABREU BASTOS (Vigo, 1927–Villaza-Gondomar, Vigo, 2004).

ANTÓN ABREU BASTOS (Vigo, 1927–Villaza-Gondomar, Vigo, 2004). “Figure,” 1969. Oil on canvas. Signed, dated, and titled on the reverse. Measurements: 70 x 50 cm; 39.5 x 73.5 cm (frame). Antón Abreu Bastos belongs to the generation of artists who drove the modernization of Galician painting during the second half of the 20th century. Although deeply connected to his homeland, he developed a fully contemporary artistic language that assimilates influences from Cubism, Expressionism, and international trends in New Figuration, integrating them into a wholly personal vision. In the work up for auction, the figure—with a hieratic and almost totemic appearance—dominates the composition with a frontal pose reminiscent of both primitive sculpture and certain approaches found in Synthetic Cubism and European Expressionism. The face, simplified to the point of resembling a mask, concentrates all the psychological intensity of the work. Antón Abreu Bastos is one of the most distinctive figures in Galician painting of the second half of the 20th century. Trained at the School of Arts and Crafts in Vigo, he developed an independent career marked by constant exploration of the human figure and formal simplification. He participated in numerous solo and group exhibitions both in Galicia and throughout the rest of Spain, establishing a pictorial language characterized by monumental forms, chromatic intensity, and a marked symbolic dimension. His work is part of major public and private collections, and he is recognized as one of the artists who made a decisive contribution to the renewal of contemporary Galician figurative art.