Marta Palau Bosch facts for kids

Marta Palau Bosch (born July 17, 1934 – died August 13, 2022) was a talented artist from Spain and Mexico. She lived most of her life in Mexico. Marta was known for her amazing work in engraving, painting, sculpture, and especially tapestries. She loved using natural materials from Mexico in her art.

Marta Palau was one of the first artists in Mexico in the 1970s to focus on important topics. She explored the experiences of women and immigrants in her art. You can see this in her tapestry series called Ilerda and later in her Nahual sculptures.

Early Life and Education

Marta Palau Bosch was born on July 17, 1934, in Albesa, Spain. Her family had to leave Spain in 1940 because of the Franco government. They moved to Mexico, where Marta grew up.

From 1955 to 1965, she studied art at a famous school in Mexico City called "La Esmeralda". This school is part of the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes (INBA). She learned engraving from a Colombian artist named Guillermo Silva Santamaría.

Marta also traveled to learn more about tapestry. She studied with Paul Lingren at San Diego State University in California. Later, she learned from Josep Grau-Garriga in Barcelona, Spain.

Artistic Career

A special display honoring Marta Palau at the Kaluz Museum in Mexico City, 2022.

In 1968, Marta Palau helped start a group called the Salón Independiente de 1968 [es]. This group was formed by artists who wanted to show their art in a different way. They were responding to a big art show linked to the 1968 Summer Olympics.

The Salón Independiente also showed support for student movements in Mexico that year. Other famous artists like Helen Escobedo and Manuel Felguérez were part of this group. The Salón continued to have exhibitions until 1970.

From 1973 to 1976, Marta worked as a coordinator for the Centre d'Art Modern in Guadalajara, Jalisco. In the early 1980s, she also started an experimental art workshop in Havana, Cuba.

In 1981, Marta Palau created a special art show to honor Lázaro Cárdenas del Río. He was a former Mexican president who helped many Spanish refugees come to Mexico during the Spanish Civil War. Her silk-screen prints in this show reflected her own family's history.

Art Exhibitions

Marta Palau's art has been shown in many places across Mexico. She had three important shows at the Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City. These were Del tapiz a la escultura (1974), Mis caminos son terrestres (1985), and Tránsitos de naualli (2012). Her art was also shown in the United States, Spain, and other Latin American countries.

Since 1982, she helped organize the Salón Michoacano del Textil en Miniatura. This was a show for small textile artworks.

In 1996, Marta Palau started the Salón Internacional de Estandartes (International Banner Biennial). She wanted to help artists from Baja California show their work to the world. She believed banners were a great way to talk about issues, especially those along the border. The artist Emilio Carballido praised her for creating new art forms at the Centro Cultural Tijuana.

In 1998, Marta also planned a huge international art show called Cinco continentes y una ciudad (Five Continents and a City). She invited curators from different continents to help. This show was so popular it happened again in 2015.

Marta Palau was also part of a group that started the Museo de Mujeres Artistas Mexicanas (MUMA) in 2008. This museum aims to record the history of Mexican women artists from the 20th century.

In 2010, Marta Palau won the Mexican Premio Nacional de Ciencias y Artes in Fine Arts. She lived in Tijuana and Mexico City.

Artistic Style and Materials

Marta Palau was not just a tapestry artist. She also worked with painting, engraving, and ceramics. Her art often combined ideas from land art, abstract expressionism, and pop art. Some of her pieces were inspired by ancient cave paintings from Baja California.

She loved using natural Mexican materials. For her tapestries, she used local fibers. In some paintings, she used native Amate paper. By adding things like wire, cord, and different fibers to her weaving, Marta and other artists created a unique Latin American art style.

Tapestry was a very important part of her work. After learning engraving, she started working with woven art in the 1970s. She even traveled to Barcelona to learn from Grau Garriga. Marta helped people see tapestry as a serious art form, not just a craft. Her woven pieces, made from henequen (a plant fiber), wool, or synthetic yarns, often felt more like sculptures.

Many art experts said that Marta Palau's tapestries showed a strong sense of feeling and beauty. Her work was influenced by a style called Catalan Informalism. This style focused on the artist's feelings and instincts. However, Marta also used her art to talk about important issues. For example, her 1976 work Los Sellos de la España Sellada (The Stamps of Stamped Spain) criticized censorship and harsh rules during the Franco dictatorship.

In 1970, Marta showed one of her most famous pieces, Ambientación Alquímica (Alchemical Atmosphere). This artwork is now in the Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo. It was an open structure you could walk into, with movable wooden walls and shapes made from cardboard and newspaper. It had numbers and letters that spelled "Tetragramaton." When you were inside, you became part of the art, which was a new idea at the time.

Her later works included large art installations and tapestries. She used natural materials like coconut fibers and dyed corn husks. Her collection called Mis caminos son Terrestres (My Roads are Lands) explored ideas about myths and art.

Marta Palau said that using natural fibers made her want to learn more about the rituals of native peoples. She believed that "Art begins as ritual magic" and that even modern people still have a bit of magic in their lives.

In her installation Nomadas II, Marta played with the idea of large, disembodied feet. This was a nod to the ancient cave paintings found in Baja California.

Her work Doble Muro (Double Wall) talked about the issue of immigrants without papers and the idea of a border wall. She created two walls on a wooden base. Inside, on the floor, was the outline of a human body made from fibers. This reminded people of the chalk outlines police use to mark where a body was found.

Themes About Women

Marta Palau's works about the Naualli (Nagual) focused on the female shaman. These pieces explored magic and the healing powers of women warriors, witches, or priestesses. The materials she used, like plant fibers, leaves, and dry branches, connected these artworks to nature and sacred traditions.

In her work Recinto de Shamanes (Shaman's Enclosure), Marta made viewers think about the difference between "outside and inside." This was similar to her Ambientación Alquímica. Both works used symbols that referred to masculine and feminine ideas.

Palau's artwork Front-era was a tall structure made of small ladders woven from twigs. This piece used the triangle shape, which can symbolize feminine mystery. It also represented immigration, as simple ladders were sometimes used by immigrants crossing the border.

Other Artistic Works

Marta Palau also designed sets for many theater and dance performances. She often worked with the writer Emilio Carballido. In 2002, she illustrated his book Venus-Quetzalcóatl y cinco cuentos. She also took part in exhibitions honoring Carballido's work in 2007 and 2014.

In 1995, Marta published a children's book called Cueva Pintada (Painted Cave). In this book, she told a legend about the ancient cave paintings in Baja California, which she also illustrated.

Selected Exhibitions

• 2014. La raiz. (A tribute to Emilio Carballido), Centro Cultural de Córdoba, Córdoba, Mexico.
• 2013–2015. Tránsitos de Naualli, Spain, Portugal, Italy.
• 2012. Tránsitos de Naualli, Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico.
• 2010. Four Rooms and a View/Mexican Masters. Fisher Museum of Art, University of Southern California, Los Angeles.
• 2007. A tribute to Emilio Carballido, Centro Cultural Tijuana, Tijuana, Mexico.
• 2006. Doble muro, installation, Sala Arte Publico Siqueiros, INBA.
• 2004. Front-era / triángulo. Lo uno y lo múltiple/Todas las guerras, Museum of Contemporary Art, La Jolla, San Diego.
• 2003. Lo uno y lo múltiple, Galería de Arte Contemporáneo y Diseño.
• 2003. Todas las guerras, 3 installations, Fisher Gallery, University of Southern California, Los Angeles.
• 2002. Nómadas II, Universitat de Lleida, Aula Magna, Sala Victor Siurana.
• 2001. Los que quedan -muro transitable-, Museo de las Californias, CECUT, Tijuana.
• 1990. Naualli. Museo de Arte Moderno del Centro Cultural Mexiquense, Toluca, Mexico
• 1985. Mis caminos son terrestres, Sala Nacional, Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico
• 1981. Un homenaje artístico a Lázaro Cárdenas, Museo de Arte Moderno.
• 1978. Marta Palau: 30 esculturas en materiales textiles, Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City

Awards and Honors

• 1986 Best Installation, Havana Biennial, Havana, Cuba.
• 1992 Burgerpreis (Guest Award), 5th Fellbach Triennale, Fellbach, Germany
• 1993, 1997, 2003 Creador Artístico Award, Fondo Nacional para La Cultura y las Artes, Mexico.
• 2010 Premio Nacional de Bellas Artes (Mexico)
• 2008 Orden de la Independencia Cultural Rubén Darío [es] (Nicaragua)
• 2002 Doctorate Honoris Causa Exilí Catalá [ca], Universitat de Lleida (Spain)
• 2018 Medalla Bellas Artes en Artes Visuales, Centro Cultural Tijuana (Mexico)

Images for kids