The Hands (Les Mains)

1968

Retrospective in Vienna

A major retrospective exhibition of the artist is held in Vienna.

27 June 1968 – 6 October 1968

Exhibition: 4. documenta

c. 1970

Objects in the paintings: pieces of furniture

Influenced by Pop Art, he begins incorporating more substantial objects into his paintings, such as parts of furniture.

early 1970s

Symbols of Catalan identity in his work

His work of the early 1970s is marked by symbols of Catalan identity, which was anathema to Franco.

1970s–1980s

Meditative emptiness and Eastern calligraphy

The paintings Tàpies produced later, in the 1970s and 1980s, reveal an aesthetic of meditative emptiness: spray-painted canvases with linear elements suggestive of Oriental calligraphy and mixed-media paintings that extend the vocabulary of Art informel, with imagery appearing only as oblique allusions within a fundamentally abstract idiom.

1970–1999

Essays on art, life and politics

His essays are collected in a series of books: “La pràctica de l'art” (1970), “L'art contra l'estètica” (1974), “Memòria personal” (1978), “La realitat com a art” (1982), “Per un art modern i progressista” (1985), “Valor de l'art” (1993) and “L'art i els seus llocs” (1999). In them he reflects on art, life and politics, on the social role of art and of the artist, on the influences on his work, and sets out his artistic and political views.