Eduardo Arroyo: Forces of Destiny

At the Hôtel des Arts in Toulon, an outstanding exhibit on Eduardo Arroyo reminds us that, even today, painting can have the strength of political commitment – a commitment to liberty, to man, culture and life. With the paintings, Eduardo Arroyo continues to make this visible with quality of invention, a colour palette and a remarkable consistency.

Eduardo Arroyo is a major figure in 20th century art. His work is already part of art history, and he embodies perhaps better than anyone the movement known as narrative figuration, which accompanied, in painting, the new wave and the new novel in the 1960s.

We might therefore expect a retrospective, didactic and chronological exhibit. But we would be wrong. While he is already a part of history, Eduardo Arroyo is also very much alive. The theme of the exhibit is the portrait, and about 100 portraits, including some made especially for the event, are exhibited at the Hôtel des Arts.

Eduardo Arroyo’s portraits seem to include time and narrative in an allegorical way, and always with some enigma that forces the viewer to take part in the game. The artist exiled from the Spanish dictatorship, paid tribute to Lluís Companys, the last President of free Catalonia, elected by the Catalan people and shot by the Spanish Government in 1940. Arroyo has never been satisfied with mere imitations.

The artist uses all the techniques and disciplines to achieve his portraits: oil, drawing, printmaking, collage, photography and sculpture. Through portraits of historical figures such as Lluís Companys, Montaigne, Marcel Cerdan, Tristan Tzara, Vincent Van Gogh, Cervantès, Stendhal, Flaubert, Joan Miró, Arroyo presents many truths to see and, in a sense, to continue with his complicity and in the name of freedom. •

Eduardo Arroyo at Hôtel des Arts Toulon, 236 Boulevard Général Leclerc, Toulon on 16 October–16 January 2016.

Main image
Eduardo Arroyo. Boxe, 1985 © ADAGP, Paris 2015