Eduardo Chillida (San Sebastián, 1924-2002) is one of the most international Spanish artists of the second half of the 20th century and undoubtedly the most renowned sculptor of this period. His work has crossed the borders of our country and is present in the collections of the most important museums. Throughout his career he has exhibited in the most important galleries and museums all over the world.

Chillida's success lies in the richness of his work, the quality of his plastic art and his constantly renewing character, which leads him to always be searching for and finding new aesthetic lines, without ever losing coherence. This richness is largely due to his courage in facing new challenges with different materials, from plaster, alabaster, iron, steel, stone, concrete, wood, marble, terracotta, paper..... In Chillida, the material ceases to be a mere support and becomes an active agent with which the artist establishes a dialogue, and together they generate surprising new works, very different from those created on other supports. On display will be an exceptional iron work from 1952 entitled ‘Three I’, in which Chillida takes three iron sickles and transforms them into a sculptural composition that establishes a dialogue with the space it inhabits, in the same way that his mythical ‘Comb of the Winds’ would do years later. The Wind Comb series also began in 1952. 

In the steel pieces he is looking more for monumentality, which can be seen in works in the exhibition such as ‘Topos - Stela VII’ from 1988, or the famous ‘Gure Aitaren Etxea’ in the Casa de Juntas in Guernica, of which he will be exhibiting a steel study from 1987. Also in steel will be a magnificent Locmariaquer VI, a piece made from a sheet of metal that Chillida cut and folded geometrically, and with which he was particularly satisfied.

Also on display will be three lurras, works made in Saint Paul de Vence (France) where he combines the volumetric character of the block with the geometric drawing that he imprints on it, either by incision or the application of oxide, in a single piece of terracotta.

Special mention should be made of his works on paper. Far from being sketches, they are another field in which Chillida develops his aesthetic research with the same interest as in the rest of his sculptural work. We will be exhibiting everything from his most gestural inks from the late 50s and early 60s, to his drawings of hands, collages with tar, and especially an important group of gravitations, where paper ceases to be a support and becomes a volumetric element of a sculptural nature.