Remedios Varo (1908-1963)

Aliases: Remei Varo

Professions: Painter

Remedios Varo (1908-1963) , Planta Insumisa
Exploración de las fuentes del río Orinoco
Remedios Varo (1908-1963) , Au Bonheur des Dames (Au Bonheur des Citoyens)
Remedios Varo (1900-1963)

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Remedios Varo Biography

(b Angles, Spain, 1908;d Mexico City, 1963) Spanish Painter. The daughter of a hydraulic engineer, Remedios Varo learned at an early age about perspective, mathematics and draftsmanship--all of which are masterfully on display in her paintings. As a child, she attended convent schools and the Academia de San Franando in Madrid. It was in Madrid that Varo met and married French poet Benjamin Péret. In the late 1930’s and 1940’s, Péret put Varo in contact with the members of the Parisian surrealist circle, after the couple moved to Paris to escape the Spanish Civil War. Varo’s interaction with this group would later influence her work. Forced to flee Paris for political reasons in 1941, the couple moved to Mexico and joined a European ex-patriot community. In Mexico, Varo met Leonora Carrington, and together they developed their painting styles. It was not until the early 1950’s that Varo was able to fully devote herself to painting. Her oneiric paintings represent an alchemic combination of varied sources ranging from philosophy, autobiography, engineering and architecture to occultism, psychology, spirituality and science. Collectively her oeuvre represents one of the most enigmatic and unique visions within the vanguard surrealist movement of the twentieth century. (Credit: Sotheby’s, New York, Latin American Art, November 18, 2008, Lot 27.)

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