One of the most outstanding representatives of twenty-first century Spanish painting, so united with literature, a discipline he also cultivates. Lacalle is the painter of irony, sumptuous colors and extreme situations. Shapes and pigments crowd together in his paintings overstating the figuration.

Abraham Lacalle began his career in Seville in the late 1980s, although it was not until 1994 that he was able to make his way in Madrid thanks to a grant from the Casa de Velázquez (House of Velázquez). In 2001 he took part in “Propios y Extraños” (Our Own and Others), a group show held by the Malrborough gallery in the capital of Spain, and then a year later he exhibited by himself at the same gallery. Since then he has become one of their house painters, and with this American firm his works have travelled on many occasions to New York, Monaco and other important cities. In 2005 the Reina Sofía Museum of Madrid devoted a large exhibit to him. His metaphors for the relation between Man and his environment were acclaimed by reviewers.

Lacalle is a harsh painter and is openly hostile to academics. His drawing, full of technical devices, delves into the Ego like in an illness of the soul, and his shapes – whether figurative or abstract – are full of grids and spirals that bring to mind cubist and neoplasticist reminiscences.

Abraham Lacalle hates banality, and he refers to painting as an “iceberg which we can only see one ninth of.” He often reflects on places that are like “maternal containers” or “protective refuges,” and to this end he paints spaces that are like cells or islands. Men become islanders, and the sea that isolates them is made up of human factors. This is something that Peter Sloterdijk called “Anthropogenous Islands.”

His work has been exhibited in prestigious collections such as the Reina Sofía in Madrid, the Andalusian Center for Contemporary Art (Seville), the Banco Santander Foundation, the Caixa de Pensiones Collection (Barcelona) and the Coca-Cola Foundation.