Manolo Valdés is a Spanish artist residing in New York, working in paint, sculpture, and mixed media. He introduced to Spain a form of expression that combined political and social obligations with humor and irony.
Manolo Valdés was born in Valencia on March 8, 1942. He entered the Escuela de Bellas Artes de San Carlos in 1957, where he studied two years. In 1964 he established the artists' group Equipo Crónica with Joan Toledo and Rafael Solbes in which he remained until Solbes' death in 1981. He now lives and works in New York City and Madrid.
Influenced by Velázquez, Rembrandt, Rubens, Matisse, Picasso, and others Valdés creates large works in which the lighting and colors express a sensation of tactility. His work is forceful and decorated with historical art symbols. Valdés creates paintings, monumental sculptures, etchings, and collages.
Along with the works he exhibited as a part of Equipo Crónicas, Valdés had over seventy expositions between 1965 and 1981, as many individual as collective.
Valdés has received various awards, including the Lissone and Biella in Milan in 1965; the silver medal in the second International Prints Biennial in Tokyo; an award from the Bridgestone Art Museum in Lisbon; the Alfons Roig Award in Valencia; the National Award for the Fine Arts in Spain; a medal from the biennial International Festival of the Plastic Arts in Baghdad; and in 1993 the Medal of the Order of Andrés Bello in Venezuela.

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