25 Facts About Maruja Mallo

Maruja Mallo is considered an artist of the Generation of 1927 within the Spanish avant-garde movement.

Mallo was the fourth daughter of fourteen children born to Justo Gomez Mallo and Maria del Pilar Gonzalez Lorenzo, born in Viveiro, Spain, on 5 January 1902.

The exhibit was a starting point from which Maruja Mallo was judged for her work and not her gender.

Maruja Mallo's work became more surrealistic in the early 1930s, including geometric visual language and themes that ranged from fruits to agricultural structures as well as creating ceramic disks with themes of fish and bulls.

Maruja Mallo returned to Madrid in 1933 and actively participated in the Society of Iberian Artists.

In that same year, Maruja Mallo, committed to the Second Spanish Republic, started teaching as a drawing professor at the Institute of Arevalo, in the School Institute of Madrid, and at the Ceramics School of Madrid, for which she designed a series of dishes that no longer exist, and where she learned mathematic and geometric concepts to use in ceramics.

Maruja Mallo frequently spent time with Miguel Hernandez, with whom she maintained a romantic relationship.

Maruja Mallo participated as a teacher in the Pedagogical Missions, which brought her closer to her homeland, Galicia, which after a few months was surprised by the Spanish Civil War.

Maruja Mallo then had an exhibit with Angel Planells of international surrealism in London's New Burlington Galleries.

When Maruja Mallo went into exile, her male partners in the creation of Spanish Avant-Garde Art, Vanguardist parties and Surrealist happenings began to boycott her, Occasioning her exclusion from the History of the Spanish Avant-Garde.

Until recent years Maruja Mallo was rarely mentioned in Spanish Texts on Art and Cultural History.

Maruja Mallo was remembered for her affairs and her otherwise scandalous behavior such as winning a "Blasphemy Contest" and riding into church on a bicycle during mass than for her artist work.

Maruja Mallo was often simply labeled a "Mascot" or "Muse" of the generation of 27.

Maruja Mallo held exhibits in Paris, Brazil and New York City.

Maruja Mallo found herself in this moment with her friend Alfonso Reyes, ambassador to Mexico in Argentina, with whom she would remain until 1938, the year in which she returned to Mexico.

In 1942 the book Maruja Mallo was published with a prologue by Ramon Gomez de la Serna.

Between 1945 and 1957, Maruja Mallo had a dark period; her public appearances and exhibits were rarer.

On 11 October 1948, Maruja Mallo left Argentina and moved to New York.

In October 1962, Maruja Mallo completed an exhibit in the Mediterranean gallery.

In Madrid in the 1980s, Maruja Mallo painted many amazing works in her geometric style, like Acrobatas and Protozoarios.

The era of intense political, social, cultural and economic change in which Maruja Mallo grew up inspired her artwork.

Maruja Mallo began using gender references in her paintings as she painted androgynous figures and large mythical females that signaled her freedom from the male-dominated artistic world of Madrid.

In 1979, Maruja Mallo began pictorial age with Los moradores del vacio.

Maruja Mallo was already 77, but still had the freshness and vitality that was present in all of her life.

In 2017, the Gallegas Day of the Arts was dedicated to Maruja Mallo, granted by the Royal Gallegan Academy of Fine Arts.