Manolo
1872 – 1945
Manolo (born Manuel Martínez Hugué) was a major Spanish (Catalan) sculptor, painter, and poet of the School of Paris. A colorful figure of Montmartre's bohemian circle and a close friend of Pablo Picasso, he developed a sensuous figurative sculpture that merged Mediterranean classical tradition (”Noucentisme”) with the simplified volumes of modern art.
Biography
Trained at Barcelona's Llotja Academy, he moved to Paris in 1900. He immersed himself in artistic life at the Bateau-Lavoir, forming lifelong friendships with Picasso, Guillaume Apollinaire, and Max Jacob while initially designing jewelry to make a living.
In 1910, he settled in Céret in the French Pyrenees, drawing his artist friends there and turning the small town into a major hub of the avant-garde. His talent was championed by renowned art dealer Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler, who signed an exclusive contract with him.
Despite his intimacy with the Cubist movement, Manolo rejected rigid geometric abstraction. He favored a robust, tactile, and poetic figuration, sculpting female torsos, bullfighters, and Catalan peasants steeped in Mediterranean heritage and Romanesque sculpture.
Afflicted with severe polyarthritis that hindered heavy physical carving in stone, he retired to Caldes de Montbui in 1928. He continued creating small-scale bronze models, gouaches, and poetry until his death, leaving a body of work celebrated in major international museums.
« Sculpture is not an idea printed on stone; it is the stone itself that must become alive. »
_EkYIX.webp)
