Antonio Hernández Carpe (Espinardo 1921-Madrid 1977)
Study for the head of Christ (?)

Study for the head of Christ (?)
Mixed media on paper. Signed and marked in the upper left-hand corner: ‘CARPE / estudio para / mural’.

Measurements: 71 x 51 cm (support); 84,5 x 64,5 x 4 cm (frame).

This work is an original by the Murcian painter and specialist in mural painting Antonio Hernández Carpe (Espinardo 1921 - Madrid 1977). After beginning to study painting at the School of Arts and Crafts in Murcia, he moved to Madrid in 1946 to continue his training in this art at the San Fernando School of Fine Arts between 1946 and 1952. There he met and worked with the painter Daniel Vázquez Díaz (1882-1969), among others. Some time later he discovered mural painting, after a stay in Rome and Naples from 1953 onwards. Fully dedicated to this discipline, his main works, using different techniques, stand out for their size and number, the main ones being: in Murcia, Provincial Hospital and Palace of Archives and Libraries (1955); those destroyed in the National Library of Madrid that same year; in Santander, Menéndez Pelayo International University (1956); in Peñíscola, Provincial House of Castellón; in Cádiz, Civil Government and headquarters of Obras del Puerto (1962/1964); in 1972, Universities of Las Palmas and Toledo; two years later, Delegación Nacional de Educación Física y Deportes (Madrid); in Logroño, Universidad Laboral (1974); again in Murcia, Colegio Mayor Ruiz de Alda (1957); in Cuenca, Colegio Menor Alonso de Ojeda; in Vitoria, Colegio Menor Explorador Iradier (1960); in Salamanca, Centro Nacional de Formación Profesional y Ocupacional.

Under the guidance of the architect José Luis Fernández del Amo (1914-1995), he directed his efforts in the decoration of new religious temples, from 1961 onwards, together with artists such as Manolo Millares, Rafael Canogar and Manuel Rivera. The poet José Hierro (1922-2002) wrote in 1976 about Carpe's pictorial figurations: ‘The theme is no more than a pretext for ordering rhythms, harmonising colours, counterbalancing masses... it would seem that geometry - the abstract composition comes first - and figuration comes later’.

His personal style was mainly influenced by Expressionism and Cubism with forays into abstraction, together with a geometrisation of his compositional elements. His main subjects include religious scenes, still lifes and animals, where he focused on his highly personal roosters and partridges.