Manuel Rivera

He was born in Granada in 1927 where he began his artistic studies, continuing them at the School of Fine Arts in Seville, where he obtained his degree as a drawing professor in 1951. That same year he established his residence in Madrid and created his first abstract works. In 1955 he traveled to Paris and became acquainted with the new informalist trends. Upon returning to Spain, he began works focused on the search for space and after a profound crisis abandoned conventional pictorial materials and began to use metallic mesh as a support. In 1957 he was a founding member of the group "El Paso" and participated in the São Paulo Biennial (with a special room) and in the Alexandria Biennial. From 1958 onwards he began to use a thicker frame that allowed him to achieve new luminous and spatial effects on two planes. That same year he initiated the Series "The Metamorphoses" in homage to Kafka. From 1961 onwards he abandoned black and white and expanded his chromatic range. Subsequently he evolved towards more constructivist approaches, initiated the series "The Mirrors" and metallic mesh ceased to interest him as material to become simply a medium. The optical vibration produced by his metallic fabrics has led his work to be related to OP and kinetic art, while on many occasions they approach lyricism. In 1981 he received the Gold Medal for Merit in the Fine Arts and in 1984 he was appointed Academician of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in Madrid.
His exhibitions, both individual and collective, have been numerous and his work is found among others in the Museum of Modern Art of the City of Paris, Paris; Tate Gallery, London; National Museum of Modern Art, Rome; Museum of Modern Art, Zurich; Reina Sofía Art Center, Madrid, etc.