Emilio Grau Sala

Son of cartoonist Juan Grau Miró, he was born in Barcelona in 1911. Although he attended the School of Fine Arts, his training is considered largely self-taught.

At the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War (1936), Grau Sala left Spain with his wife,[citation needed] the also painter Ángeles Santos, and settled in Paris.

In Paris, Grau Sala knows the avant-garde up close but clearly opts for a friendly and colorful figuration, derived from Impressionism and Fauvism.

Grau Sala's style, of a vague impressionism served with a lively and varied palette, finds open doors in the publishing and graphic world.

In 1963, Grau Sala returned to Barcelona, when the stagnant figuration of Franco's Spain began to be challenged by Oteiza, Chillida, Antoni Tàpies and the “El Paso” collective (Antonio Saura, Manolo Millares, Rafael Canogar).

After his death, and for more than a decade, the art of Grau Sala was overshadowed by the multiple novelties that affluent in democratic Spain.