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Núria Picas i Codina, key figure of the second Catalan avant-gardes, dies
The artist Núria Picas i Codina, a relevant figure in the formation of the second Catalan avant-gardes, died yesterday at the age of 99, as confirmed by her family. Trained in the late 1940s with Ramon Calsina, Picas demonstrated from the beginning a restless attitude and a clear desire for artistic renewal, in a context marked by the cultural limitations of Francoism.
His early career was enriched by participation in the circles promoted by the Cercle Maillol, the Cercle Literari and the Institut Français, fundamental meeting spaces that allowed him to establish links with artists and intellectuals of his generation, as well as expand his interests towards other disciplines such as literature and architecture. This cultural ecosystem was decisive in the consolidation of a work open to dialogue with contemporary European currents.
In 1948, his work was first shown to the public at the Salons d'Octubre in Barcelona, a key platform for the visibility of a painting that moved away from academicism and questioned the aesthetic canons of the regime's official art. One of the culminating moments of his career would come in 1954 with the exhibition at Els Blaus in Sarrià, where he presented a set of works with hagiographic themes and a medievalizing style, which evidenced a personal reading of tradition and a singular formal research.
At the same time, Picas developed a remarkable production in the field of portraiture, leaving images of great psychological intensity of prominent figures of Catalan culture such as Maria Aurèlia Capmany, Enric Jardí or Jordi Sarsanedas. His work, coherent and demanding, constitutes today a valuable testimony of a generation of artists who worked from discretion but with a clear vocation for modernity.
