Juan Muñoz
| Juan Muñoz | |
|---|---|
|
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| Born |
June 17, 1953 Madrid |
| Died | August 28, 2001 (aged 48) Ibiza |
| Occupation | Sculptor, radio script writer |
Juan Muñoz (June 17, 1953 – August 28, 2001) was a Spanish sculptor, working primarily in paper maché, resin and bronze. He was also interested in the auditory arts and created compositions for the radio. He was a self-described "storyteller". In 2000, Muñoz was awarded Spain's major Premio Nacional de Bellas Artes in recognition of his work; he died shortly after, in 2001.
Juan Muñoz was born in 1953, the second of seven brothers, into a prosperous, educated family in Madrid. He was enrolled in a local school but became bored and was expelled, so his father retained a poet who was also an art critic to provide lessons, which gave Muñoz an awareness of modernism. He grew up under Franco's repressive regime. In the 1970s, he moved to England to study at Croydon College and the Central School of Art and Design. There he met his wife, sculptor Cristina Iglesias, with whom he has two children, Diego (b. 1995) and Lucia (b. 1989). His marriage to Cristina also made him the brother-in-law of the Academy Award nominated film composer, Alberto Iglesias. In 1982 he was awarded a Fulbright scholarship and traveled to the United States to study at the Pratt Institute in New York City. He spoke an idiosyncratic English, learned from his experience as a waiter in New York restaurants.
His first exhibition was in 1984 in the Fernando Vijande gallery of Madrid. Since then, his works have been frequently exhibited in Europe and other parts of the world. At the beginning of the 1990s, Juan Muñoz began breaking the rules of traditional sculpture by sculpting works in a "narrative" manner which consisted of creating smaller than life-size figures in an atmosphere of mutual interaction. Muñoz's sculptures often invite the spectator to relate to them, making the viewer feel as if they have discreetly become a part of the work of art. His slate-gray or wax-colored monochrome figures create a sort of discreetness due to their lack of individuality, but that absence of individuality questions the viewer, perhaps even so much as to make the viewer uncomfortable. When asked his occupation, Muñoz would respond simply that he was a "storyteller."
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