The exhibition, titled "Avant-garde Bullfighting Posters: From Picasso to Barceló", can be visited at the Picasso-Museum-Eugenio Arias Collection in Buitrago del Lozoya from today until December 8th. Curated by Àngela Suau Gomila and Fernando González Viñas, the exhibition offers a journey through the evolution of this graphic format.
From its beginnings as a mere printed advertisement, the bullfighting poster became a key medium for understanding the evolution of public image, popular culture, and advertising in Spain. The first preserved advertising poster in the country, dated 1737, announced a bullfight in Madrid, marking the start of the relationship between text, image, and urban space.
Over time, these prints evolved, incorporating more complex graphic elements, vignettes, and ornamental frames, eventually becoming highly expressive pieces that encapsulated the event, the arena, the protagonists, and the aesthetics of each era, reflecting one of Spain's main cultural manifestations.
A significant turning point in the genre was marked by Pablo Picasso with his series of works created between 1954 and 1961 in Vallauris. Picasso simplified the poster to its essential elements—word, place, year, and a symbolic image—opening a new horizon for the format.
Following this renewal, the exhibition progresses into the second half of the 20th century and the early 21st centuries, highlighting commissions of posters to contemporary artists such as Eduardo Arroyo, Guillermo Pérez Villalta, Josep Guinovart, Navarro Baldeweg, and Danh Vo, among others, by institutions, festivals, and bullrings.
Special relevance is given to Miquel Barceló's approach to bullfighting. His expressionist and material style transforms the bullring into an almost abstract space, merging the plastic intensity of the bull, gesture, violence, and fragility.
The exhibition features works by artists of the caliber of Fernando Botero, Eduardo Úrculo, Carmen Calvo, Norman Foster, and Miquel Barceló himself, offering a comprehensive view of the artistic evolution of this format.
Avant-garde Bullfighting Posters: From Picasso to Barceló
