Lázaro Ferré, José Luis
Barcelona 1945
He begins his studies in the Baixas Academy.
San Jorge Art College.
Mural painting school in San Cugat del Vallés, under the teacher Miquel Farré, with a scholarship from the Barcelona Provincial Council.
He studies engraving at the Art College.
He collaborates with the painter Ramón Vincens on the Bankisur mural in Barcelona (Chamber of Commerce).
Assistant to Professor Francisco Ribera Gómez at the San Jorge Art College.
PRIZES
1968 First prize for drawing San Jorge Art College
First prize for Christmas cards San Jorge Art College
1969 First prize for drawing San Jorge Art College
Second prize for painting San Jorge Art College
1970 Prize from Barcelona City Council for the most distinguished student of the 1969-70 academic year.
Scholarship from the Rodríguez Acosta Foundation in Granada.
1971 Study scholarship in the Paluar de Segovia, silver medal from the Regional Council of Segovia.
1972 XIV Painting Prize, Joven Sala Parés. Premio F.Gimeno
1976 Picasso bronze medal. Málaga
Second prize for painting in the “Premio Miguel Carbonell”, in Molins de Rey.
INDIVIDUALS EXHIBITIONS
1973 Sala Prócer, Barcelona
1974 Galería Grup S.A., Barcelona
1975 Galería Anglada, Barcelona
Galería Agora 3, Sitges
Galería Picasso, Málaga
1976 Galería Toba, Cuenca
Galería Grup S.A., Barcelona
Galería Vermeer, Logroño
Galería Bética, Madrid
1977 Sala Vayreda, Barcelona
Sala El Centauro, Sitges
1978 Galería Picasso, Málaga
1979 Cercle Artistic, Tortosa
1980 Cau de la Carreta, Sitges
1981 Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1983 Galería Picasso, Málaga
1984 Galería Picasso, Málaga
1985 Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1986 Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1987 Galería Luisa López, Tarragona
1990 Galería Grifé y Escoda, Barcelona
1994 Galería Grifé y Escoda, Barcelona
2000 Galería Kreisler, Madrid
2001 Galería Grifé y Escoda, Barcelona
2003 Galería Maria Salvat, Barcelona
2004 Galería i Leonarte, Valencia
2005 Art Gallery at Convento de San José de Brihuega, Guadalajara
2006 Zig Zag Art Gallery, San Andrés de LLavaneras, Barcelona.
2007 Nou Mil-lenni Art Gallery, Barcelona.
2007 Sala de Exposiciones Caixa Laietana, Mataro
JOINT EXHIBITION
1970 “Fundación Rodriguez Acosta”, Granada
1971 Caja de Ahorros, Segovia
1972 Circulo Artístico, Barcelona
Sala Prócer, Barcelona
1973 Sala Prócer, Barcelona
1974 Sala Prócer, Barcelona
1975 Galería Agora 3, Sitges
Saló de la Tardor de la Sala Vayreda, Barcelona
Sala Vayreda, Barcelona
1976 Fira Nacional de Dibuix, Sala Parés, Barcelona
Salo de la Tardor Agora 3, Sitges
Colectiva de dibujos. Sala Vayreda, Barcelona
1977 Colectiva en la Sala El Centauro, Sitges
1978 “Siete pintores jóvenes” Sala Parés Barcelona
Pintores de Sitges in the "Sala Valenti" in
Vilanova i la Geltru
1979 Colectiva Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1980 Colectiva Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1981 Colectiva Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1982 Colectiva Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1983 Colectiva Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1984 Colectiva Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1985 Colectiva Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1986 Colectiva Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1987 Colectiva Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1992 Galería Casrey, Barcelona
1993 Colectiva Galería Agora 3, Sitges
1995 Galería del Mar, Barcelona
2005 Florence Biennale
2006 Galería Nou Mil-lenni
2007 Galería Nou Mil-lenni
Press Coverage
“José Luis Lázaro Ferré stands out among Catalans for the number and quality of his works”
EL IDEAL, GRANADA
“José Luis Lázaro Ferré exhibits two extraordinary drawings and some landscapes where the theme is only a pretext or support for the rhythmic play of the brushstrokes, with a predomination of reds and mauves which take on a radically musical tessitura”
EL ADELANTADO, SEGOVIA
“Lázaro Ferré paints with almost pure or totally pure colour, in loose, but well conjugated brushstrokes, without irritating fading-out, allowing them to vibrate with a subtle, almost breathable air.....
.....he has a certain propensity for ”fauve” chromatism which is compensated by the feeling of the light....”
MUNDO DIARIO
Francesc Gali
“.....A peaceful vision which discovers and reveals reality rather than repeating, inventing and counting, from a contained and quite explicit impressionism. Lázaro Ferré, is an artist for whom we predict a happy future, judging by a close look at his current work”
SUR
J. Mayorga
Lázaro Ferré, is a highly sensitive artist who shows his training, professionalism and creative ability with great simplicity. Unquestionably, a good exhibition”
NUEVA RIOJA
Roberto Iglesias
Lázaro Ferré works from a realism as crude as life itself and enhances it on the massive filling of colour, making it simple, pleasant, almost poetic, without needing to fall back on tradgedy. Sensitivity here has its greatest transcendency, because the light has no prescribed path or defined time. Lázaro Ferré is a born artist.”
EL NOTICIERO UNIVERSAL
Rafael Santos Torroella
“His vision of the 'Sagrada Familia' is an example of his mastery, sidestepping the architectural theme and turning the Gaudian facade into a purely pictorial question.”
EL CORREO CATALÁN
“With his vibrant pallet and fleeting vision, the painter constructs his landscapes, his still lives, his figure themes. But this passionate vehemence, almost a "fauve" resonance or a light expressionism, is contained by the ordering and balancing tendency which marks the constant effect of the work of Lázaro Ferré.”
EL CORREO CATALÁN
“Talent and sensitivity in the approach of the paintings, with excellent qualities and textures. Works which will be enjoyed.
DIARIO DE TARRAGONA
Vicente J. Amiguet
Reviews from his exhibition at the Kreisler Gallery in Madrid from February 17 to March 11, 2000.
EL PUNTO DE LAS ARTES
Editor: José Pérez-Guerra
Madrid, 25 February to 2 March 2000
Lázaro Ferré and the Joy of Living
by Julián H. Miranda
Just like Matisse in his famous painting The Joy of Living, where the great French painter evokes a mythical image of the world as he wished it to be in a kind of golden age, in the paintings of José Luis Lázaro Ferré (Barcelona, 1945) there is an idea of universal harmony, whether in the figures, still lifes with or without landscape, or in his somewhat surreal compositions, with that classicist arrangement through which he manages to strike a difficult balance between lyricism and avant-garde elements that take us back to Cezanne and especially Picasso. The Catalan painter studied at the Escuela Superior de Bellas Artes de San Jorge and later expanded his knowledge of mural painting and engraving. His drawing ability stood out right from the start and he won a number of prestigious awards as a young artist, including the Barcelona City Hall Award and the 14th Sala Parés Youth Painting Prize. Most of his individual exhibits have been held in Catalan cities, though he has also exhibited in Malaga, Cuenca, Logroño and Madrid. The Madrid exhibit was held 24 years ago at the Bética gallery.
Lázaro Ferré now presents about 30 pieces at the Kreisler gallery, including oils and works on paper. He once again demonstrates his warm simplicity in works such as Terrace, by placing a flower pot and fruit on a table with a spacious background that shows us a poetic and unequivocally Mediterranean Sea; The Café, a small still life with fountain pen, spectacles, pipe, black telephone, bottle, glass and oil lamp, with a small frame that provides a hint of the human presence. He does it with that subtlety in the rhythm of greys, which becomes more ironic in Still Life with Fly Swatter. His attraction to the human figure comes out again in Lovers I and II, with a woman listening to a seashell and a man playing the cello with a musicality in the blue tones that endows their bodies with considerable plastic solidity, something that comes out again in Balancing Act, an oil painting on paper with a woman, who has a Cubist air about her, standing on a horse’s back. Thanks to the steady gradation of yellows, the hard profile of her face is somehow accentuated. Musical rhythms, nature and the human figure are present in many of these works, such as The Guitar, the Cat and the Bird; Chess, Violin and Fish; Fruit with Violin and In Tune, where he displays a masterly command of the use of pastels with a violin on a round table delimiting the space. The exhibition also includes his original landscapes of Seville and Sitges, the plasticity and elegance of his somewhat Magritte-style Hats, and the incredible detail of Table with Lemons, with its fluent brushstrokes that draw out the yellows against a greyish background to create a plastic language rife with stylistic coherence.
(Kreisler, Hermosilla 8, Madrid. Until 11 March 2000.)
EXPANSION
25 February 2000
Lázaro Ferré, at the Kreisler
José Luis Lázaro Ferré is an extraordinary landscape artist who uses his artistic sensitivity to explore simplicity and his own inexhaustible creative capacity. His widely varying palette shows that his talent is growing by the day, and he is also a perfectionist because every detail in his paintings is handled with the utmost care.
Moreover, his extensive experience allows him to escape unscathed when applying and mixing colors and when producing his now characteristic chiaroscuros.
All this should draw our attention to the fact that Lázaro Ferré is one of the best artists of the moment, and entirely capable of awakening the sensitivity of his admirers. This is an unbeatable opportunity to visit the gallery and acquire art that is not only beautiful, but a good deal for the money.
Lázaro Ferré has a profound sense of order, which leads him to give priority to the harmonious structure of the composition. And he does not take the tragic route or massively pile on color, two of the frequent errors of mediocre painters. The constant dialogue between perspective, balance and compositional harmony charges his paintings with more than solid experience.
And yet his brushstrokes are free and smooth, as if he let all his wisdom softly slip into the canvas.
Lázaro Ferré. Kreisler Gallery. Calle Hermosilla 8, Madrid.
February-March
El Periódico de Catalunya
Wednesday, May 21, 2003
ART
The clean avant-garde style of Lázaro Ferré
Maria Salvat Gallery
Princesa Sofía Hotel
Plaza de Pius XII, 4
Barcelona
José Luis Lázaro Ferré has an excellent feel for composition and skillfully uses sketching and color to create situations where objects float, leaving individual thought to establish hierarchies between the most varied objects. The hat represents intelligence, while the pipe and cigar embody the vitality of ideas that create styles and transmit the freshness of each moment.
Although historical avant-garde influences are present in Lázaro Ferré’s work, he is not a simple disciple, but someone who has been able to capture and blend the essence of each moment and make it his own. His stimulating paintings are characterized by their clean lines, while the apparent confusion belies an inner order. Well worth a visit.
JOSEP M. CADENA
Statement
I think the easiest way to define my activity as an artist and my intellectual approach to art would be to quote Apollinaire’s thesis in his Les Peintres cubistes: méditations esthétiques, especially the following sections:
... Therefore, as an offer to the spirit, in the plastic arts, the fourth dimension should be generated by the three known dimensions: represented by the immensity of space eternally present in all the dimensions of a given moment …
... Cubism differs from the painting that came before it because it is not the art of imitation, but the art of thought raised to the level of creation …
... Scientific cubism is one of the pure trends. It is the art of painting new compositions with elements taken not from visual reality, but from the reality of knowledge …
... Physical cubism is the art of painting compositions with elements taken primarily from virtual reality …
In my painting, I work with geometric figures arranged on different planes that overlap one another and blend into real shapes (bottles, cats, birds, fruit), fabricated objects (small origami birds and paper boats) and everyday things (hats, shoes, etc.) to create a world of mystery and sensuality. The lines I draw are devised and expressed as sensual, mystic happiness.
My works are full of shapes and visual configurations that diversify, overlap and repeat to activate an imaginary world that is also real in order to create an emotional charge and an atmosphere of poetic expression.
Works in which paint and air combine to create plastic expression.
Lázaro Ferré
Spain
