Fernando Briones Carmona (April 30, 1905–July 28, 1988) was a Spanish painter. He was born in Écija and died in Madrid, where he spent most of his life.
Childhood and early years
He showed very early a deep interest for the Fine Arts and took drawing lessons from different local painters in Écija (Sevilla). Son of retail merchants, his parents were conscious of his strong vocation and realising that his dream was to become a painter, they gave eventually their consent to his departure for Madrid. When he was only 14 years old he moves to the capital to enter the Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando. He prepares his accession exams drawing and copying sculptures in the Museo Nacional de Reproducciones Artísticas. As soon as he becomes fifteen, the minimum age for admission, he succeeds his first attempt to enter the Academy and immediately enrols in oil painting, encaustic, tempera, etching, watercolour and sculpture. He completed the five compulsory years in the Academy and then remained two more years developing teaching activities, to finally achieve a Master’s degree. Among his fellow students figured Salvador Dalí, with whom he developed a close friendship fuelled by their reciprocal admiration.
Artistic education
His teachers in the Academy included Cecilio Plá and José Benedito (painting), José Moreno Carbonero and Julio Romero de Torres(drawing) and Francisco Esteve Botey (etching). Between 1924 and 1927 he is awarded with a fellowship from the Fundación Molina Higueras and also obtains on two occasions a scholarship to join the Artist’s Summer Residence in el Paular (Madrid). His work, presented in a common exhibition with other resident artists is accredited with a diploma with honours. He also obtains two residence scholarships to visit during the summer the Artist’s Residence of the Alhambra (Granada). At the closing exhibition hosted by the residence, he meets Federico García Lorca, Manuel de Falla and Daniel Vázquez Díaz, who highly praises his paintings. In 1930, the Junta para la Ampliación de Estudios e Investigaciones Científicas awards him with a scholarship to visit Paris and its drawing academy. In 1932 he participates for the first time in the Exposición Nacional (National Exhibition) and he is awarded with the Bronze Medal for his work “Portrait”. In the same year he presents a colour aquatint in the International Exhibition of Venice. In 1933 he obtains a position as a drawing teacher in a high school in Elche, but he resigns after only one year and comes back to Madrid. In 1934 he wins the Silver Medal in the Exposición Nacional for his picture “Chinese mannequin”, painted in the Museo Arqueológico de Madrid. In 1935 he is appointed as head of studies in the Escuela de Artes Aplicadas y Oficios Artísticos de Madrid, in the graphic design section.
The Spanish civil war years
During the Spanish civil war he joins the teacher’s union FETE-UGT and the Alianza de Intelectuales Antifascistas (Alliance of Antifascist Intellectuals) which included among its leading figures the poet Rafael Alberti. During this period graphic artists contributed to the war effort producing signs, notices and placards for the Republican Army. As public servants enlisted in the popular militias, he joined the Quinto regimiento (Fifth Regiment). He was comrade of great poets, as the unrecalled and much admired by him Antonio Aparicio (later forced into exile) and Miguel Hernández. During these years he carries out an intense artistic activity. In 1937 he participates in the Paris International Exposition with a painting featuring the shooting of Federico García Lorca. This canvas, later displayed in the Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in an exhibition commemorating the Spanish pavilion of the International Exposition, is hosted by the Museo de Arte Moderno of Barcelona. In 1943, the Real Academia de San Fernando awards him with the fellowship Conde de Cartagena.
Plenitude
In 1946, his work “Portrait” obtains the First medal in the Salón de Otoño (Madrid). The following year he is awarded with the Second price in the National Painting Contest and in 1948, he wins the First price with his work “Bathers”. In 1950 he obtains a faculty position as Art lecturer on drawing in the Escuela de Artes Aplicadas y Oficios Artísticos de Madrid and is awarded with the First price in the national competition organised by the Unión Española de Explosivos for his painting “The sorcerer”. This year, commissioned by the Unión Española de Explosivos, he paints the rock salt mines of Cardona (Barcelona). In 1951 his painting “Sleeping dancer”, later purchased for a private collection in Mexico, obtains the second price in a public vote organised during the Primera Bienal Hispanoamericana de Arte (Madrid). In 1952 he is awarded with the Second medal at etching in the Exposición Nacional de Bellas Artes (National Exhibition of Fine Arts). In 1954 he obtains a scholarship to develop pedagogic studies about drawing in France and Italy. In 1955 he obtains the First price in the Fine Arts Exhibition of Linares (Jaén). In 1958 he participates in a competition to design the tapestry cartoons intended for the Valley of the Fallen National Monument, in Cuelgamuros (Madrid), obtaining the First price. In 1962 he is appointed as Director of the Escuela 7ª de Artes y Oficios Artísticos de Madrid.
He could be defined as a complete painter, as he addressed all the possible subjects, including landscapes, still lifes, figures and portraits using the most diverse techniques, from watercolour to fresco. He worked in his artist’s studio in the Madrilenian street of Hortaleza, where he took full advantage of the particular light and orientation of his penthouse, which became a sort of magic box that produced his still lifes and figures, all painted from life. He often travelled to Galicia, Asturias, Cantabria and the Basque Country and became a passionate lover of the Spanish northern coast, where he painted the many landscapes he used to present in the Salones de Otoño. In 1942 he married in Llanes (Oviedo) his wife Isabel Fernández-Pola, a member of a family of Llanes intellectuals. He was a great portrayer and many of his works are nowadays hosted in different private collections. In 1968, the cessation of the National Exhibitions and the Salones de Otoño and his bad relationship with art critics, especially embittered after the publication of his article “I, a Spanish painter” – which included a ferocious criticism of contemporary pictorial movements – drove him to withdraw from all public exhibitions and motivated his refusal to sell any painting in Spain. In fact, most of his production was thereafter sold in the United States. Nonetheless, he continued painting assiduously until his last days. In 1975 he retired from the Artes y Oficios Artísticos de Madrid. A street named “Pintor Fernando Briones” was dedicated to him in his birthplace, Écija (Sevilla).
Individual exhibitions
1943 Salón Cano.
1945 Sala Vilches.
1946 Salón Cano.
1949 Salón Dardo.
1949 University of Oviedo.
1952 Salón Dardo.
1955 Salón Dardo.
1957 Sala Vilches.
1962 Salón Cano. This year, a No-Do (News and Documentaries newsreels) featuring his work was filmed in his studio.
Collective exhibitions
1924 Palacio de Biblioteca y Museos, Fellows of the Residence of el Paular (Madrid).
1925 Salón de Exposiciones del Museo de Arte Moderno, “Landscape and Figures by the Fellows of the Residence of el Paular and Asturias”.
1927 Ateneo de Granada, “Landscape’s Exhibition by the Fellows of the Residence of la Alhambra (Granada)”.
1932 Exposición Nacional, Bronze medal.
1933 Círculo de Bellas Artes, Exhibition of paintings and sculptures.
1934 Exposición Nacional, “Chinese mannequin” and “Women brushing their hair”, Silver medal.
1942 Salón de Otoño, “Flora”.
1943 Sala Vilches, New modern painters.
1944 Salón de Otoño, “Country girls”.
1945 Exposición Nacional, “Melancholic Pierrot”. Museo Nacional de Arte Moderno, Vases and Still lifes by the Association of Painters and Sculptors, “Children portraits”.
1946 Sala Macarrón, Collective Exhibition by the Association of Painters and Sculptors, “Women portraits”. Salón Cano, Artists Exhibition.
1947 Sala Kebos, Paintings and Drawings by the Association of Painters and Sculptors, “Composition with figures”. Sala Greco, bullfighting scenes, National Contest, Second price (Encaustic).
1948 Ministerio de Agricultura, Mural painting National Contest, First Price.
1949 Círculo de Bellas Artes, Annual Grand Prix Exhibition, National Exhibition, “Painter”, “Dancer” and “The truth”.
1950 Unión Española de Explosivos Grand Contest. First Price in the National Exhibition, “Fernandito and Maribel” and “The musician angel”.
1951 Morocco and Colonies, Paintings of Africa, Bienal Hispanoamericana de Arte, Madrid.
1952 Association of Spanish engravers, Goya and the Spanish etching in America. Sala Los Sótanos, Three painters.
Reliable sources
en artprice.com [Fernando Briones Carmona]
es:Fernando Briones Carmona
http://www.maxam.net/en/fundacion/coleccion_maxam/artistas/briones_carmona_fernando
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