GINÉS PARRA (Zurgena, Almería, 1896 - Paris, France,... Lot n° 37

GINÉS PARRA (Zurgena, Almería, 1896 - Paris, France, 1960). "On the beach". Oil on canvas. Signed in the lower margin. Measures: 22,5 x 29 cm; 47,5 x 53 cm (frame). Ginés Parra, whose real name was José Antonio Ramón Parra Menchón, spent his childhood in Algeria, working with his father as a miner. After several trips to Argentina and other South American countries between 1910 and 1916, he moved to the United States. He worked in copper mines in Arizona and later settled in Los Angeles. He soon moved to New York, where he began taking classes at the Students League. He later began his art studies at the National Academy School of Fine Arts in the same city, although he was forced to continue working in the subway and as a waiter to survive. Around 1920 he settled in Paris, in a studio in the Montparnasse district, to continue his training at the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Art. In the early days he continued, as always, to work on the fringes of art, this time as a car washer and grocer. However, soon after he made contact with other painters such as Pablo Picasso, Julio González or Manuel Ángeles Ortiz, and with them he participated in various exhibitions, such as the Society of French Artists, the Salon d'Automne or the Salon des Indépendants. In 1922 he exhibited with Joaquín Roca at the Du Taureau Gallery in Paris and, soon after, one of his most praised works at the Salon des Indépendants, "Leda and the Swan", was acquired by a gallery in Boston. Between the thirties and forties his fame was established and he distinguished himself as a member of the New School of Paris. However, due to economic problems he was forced to dispose of his extensive art collection, which included works by Degas, Modigliani, Guillaumin and Picasso himself. The outbreak of the Civil War surprised Ginés Parra in Madrid, where he decidedly aligned himself with the Republican side, for which he was imprisoned. He only regained his freedom thanks to the intercession of Pancho Cossío. In the following years he travels several times to Spain, and exhibits in various cities in Europe and America: in Prague in 1946, Brussels and Stockholm in 1947, London, Lima, Sao Paulo, Mexico City, Havana, Buenos Aires... He also continues to hold exhibitions in Paris, and in 1959 he exhibits with Picasso at the Trouche gallery, and with Oscar Dominguez in Brittany. That same year he was diagnosed with cancer and, after several months of illness, he died in Paris in April 1960. Shortly after, the Salon des Indépendants dedicates an anthological exhibition to him, and Picasso and other friends create the Society of Friends of Parra. He is represented in the Narodni Muzeum in Prague, the Mosavska Galerie in Brno (Czech Republic), the Museums of Fine Arts in Boston and Havana, the Museum of Art in São Paulo, the Patio Herreriano Museum of Contemporary Art in Valladolid and the ARTIUM in Vitoria, among others.