Miquel Ibarz Roca (1920-1987)

Biographical Sketch

Miguel Ibarz Roca was born in 1920 in Mequinenza (Aragon) and studied in Barcelona. Ibarz belonged to the Barcelona Group and therefore came into early contact with Catalonia's most renowned artists: particularly Picasso, Miró and Tàpies, but also Villèlia, Clavé, Llovet and Riera. His beginnings were marked by group exhibits at the Sala Gaspar, where his work would later be exhibited in a one-man show (catalogue). Ibarz did artwork for many buildings: murals in the parrish church of Mequinenza and the music room at the Antigua Escuela de Mar (1948-49), at the Radio Station España in Barcelona (1957) and at the Caja de Ahorros bank in Manlleu (1960-61). Created mosaics for churches in Hospitalet, near Barcelona (1951). Lived in Paris (1952-53) and traveled through Italy, Switzerland, Britain and Germany. Ibarz considered himself above all a lithographer. Beginning in 1956, he created lithographs for the Arta Zurich and Sala Gaspar galleries in Barcelona. In 1977 began collaborating with the Grafos Verlag publishing house of Vaduz. Ibarz's brilliant lithographs are characterized by a glazed look. Basing his work first on Cézanne and then, in the 70's, turning towards De Staël's painting, Ibarz arrived at his idealized, brilliantly decorative style, in which he painted the landscape of the Côte d'Azur and the Catalan coast near his summer studio (Sant Pol de Mar). A leitmotif of his work in his last years had become the song-birds who kept him company. Miquel Ibarz Roca died in 1987. ek

(*)

References:

Ibarz. Pintura. Colección Sala Gaspar 1972.

Miquel Ibarz. Deu Anys de Pintura 1974-1984. Sala Gaspar, Barcelona.

(*)

Note:

The references given are not meant as a list of the best works available on the subject, but simply reflect the author's sources.

Registers and catalogues of works are included when known and correspond to the information given in the index.