JOAQUÍN CAPA (Santander, 1941)."Open colours".Lithograph on paper. Copy 38/50.Signed and numbered in pencil.Measurements: 76 x 57 cm.Joaquín Capa began his artistic training at the San Fernando School of Fine Arts in Madrid. After finishing his studies in 1972 he decided to move to Paris for a year in order to deepen and develop his knowledge of engraving. In 1983 he returned to Madrid, where he received a grant from the Ministry of Culture for research into engraving techniques. After this period of time, he studied philosophy in Rome and Madrid, architecture in Madrid and sociology of art in Paris. He received scholarships from the March Foundation and the Ministry of Culture. He was awarded the Prize at the I International Biennial of Bhopal in India, a place with which he maintains a relationship, due to his work as a visiting professor at the University of Baroda in 1983, 1989 and 1990. During his artistic career, he has participated in several collective and individual exhibitions, located in important artistic spaces such as the Seiquer Gallery, Madrid 1976, the Cellini Gallery and Estampa Gallery, Madrid 1979, the Municipal Museum of Fine Arts, Santander 1980, the Municipal Museum of Fine Arts, Santander 1983, the Botín Foundation, Santander 1987, the Tórculo Gallery, Madrid 1988, the Lluc Fluxá Gallery, Palma de Mallorca 1989, the Tórculo Gallery, Madrid 1990, the Bat Gallery, Madrid 1992. He has also shown his work in Burgos, Málaga, Valencia, Seville, Vitoria, Ciudad Real, Valladolid, as well as in Utrecht and Maastrich (Holland). In various museums such as the Museo Abstracto de Cuenca, Centro de Arte Reina Sofía de Madrid, Museo Municipal de Bellas Artes de Santander, Museum of Modern Art of New York, Los Angeles Country Museum of Art, Fundación Gulbenkian, Lisbon.A painter and engraver, capa's work is defined by an informalist language. In his work he allows total freedom to the unforeseen, to the play of chromatism and even to different materials. Capa is a creator of atmospheres, through abstract pictorial spaces where forms and randomness generate an expressive and dynamic language. Regarding the understanding of Capa's work, it is interesting to rescue the words of the artist himself, about his artistic conception; "In engraving there is a wonderful thing: time is different and allows you to lighten and darken the stains. At the moment I like to work directly on the plate. I start with acid and then I work on it. I combine different techniques in one plate. Over the years I have seen that I have a lot of prints from my own editions that are no longer in series. I have decided to revive them. With a revival in which I intervene them directly with wet techniques based on acrylics. With this technique I manage to allow painting and engraving to travel together".Today his work can be found in various private collections and in important art centres, including the MoMA in New York, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Gulbenkian Foundation in Lisbon, the Museo de Arte Abstracto in Cuenca, the Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid and the Museo Municipal de Bellas Artes in Santander, among others.