Anda (Jose Ramón)

José Ramón Anda Goikoetxea was born in Bacáicoa / Bakaiku (Navarra) in 1949. He comes from a family of carvers and cabinetmakers; so he soon came into contact with the constructive qualities of wood, an element very present in his natural environment. His home-workshop stands nowdays in his birthplace.

He studied at the San Fernando Superior School of Fine Arts (Madrid) between 1970 and 1974. During those years he focused on the expressionist representation of the human body, obtaining that same year a scholarship to study at the Spanish Academy of Fine Arts in Rome. There he was closely acquainted with classical sculpture, as well as that of prominent 20th century Italian artists - Giacomo Manzú, Marino Marini and Arturo Martini - who were to influence his work. These artists also influenced the great Navarrese sculptor Jorge Oteiza, whose theories about space and the process of sculptural work beat in Anda's art pieces.

To these Italian influences, those of the Swiss sculptor, designer and architect Max Bill, a student of Walter Gropius (Bauhaus School) are added, as well as his admiration for formal perfection and respect for the matter of another Basque sculptor, Eduardo Chillida.

Anda started early as a sculptor working with various materials, certainly with wood due to the family tradition, but also with stone, metals and concrete. At the beginning of the eighties Jorge Oteiza and Eduardo Chillida publicly praised the quality of his work and Anda became famous in the Basque Country and Navarre, until his popularity expanded to wider geographical areas.

Anda has developed an abstract sculpture, with an organicist base where his sensitive gaze, rationalist and specialist approaches converge. To be highlighted are the the sensory aspects of the matter, which he saves and relaunches with a figurative halo.

For a time he was a professor at the School of Fine Arts of the University of the Basque Country and today, due to his determined confinement in the workshop and his distance from the artistic media, he is almost a cult artist. With more than forty years of uninterrupted creative trajectory, Anda is a sculptor who maintains an artistic activity in which he continues to experiment with forms and materials, always faithful to the formal perfection that Chillida inspired him.

Among other awards, Anda has received the Vitoria Biennial Sculpture Prize in 1978, the First International Sculpture Prize Ángel Orensanz, Sabiñánigo, Huesca in 1982, the First San Sebastián Biennial Sculpture Prize in 1983, the First Prize of the Second Contest International Sculpture in the City of Jaca, Huesca, in 1983, the First Prize for Sculpture in the Gure Artea Competition of the Basque Government in 1983, the Prize in Sculpture in the City Council of Zarautz, Guipúzcoa in 1989, the Prize in Sculpture in the City Council of Zumárraga-Villarreal de Urrechua, Guipúzcoa in 1993 and the Second Caja Madrid National Sculpture Prize in 1997

Anda has carried out multiple public works commissions among which are: Zeharki (1982-1989) in the gardens of Avenida de Satrústegui in San Sebastián, Tribute to Juan de Antxieta, Plaza Hiru-bide in Pamplona, Navarra, Lehioa (1989) in Zarauz, Polifemo / Leida (1993) in the Antoniuti Park of Pamplona, Goruntz (1980-1994) in Zumárraga, Guipúzcoa, Belak (2000-2001) in Baquio, Vizcaya, Haizean, (1978-2002) in Tolosa, Guipúzcoa, Zeharki II (2000-2002) in Galdácano, Vizcaya, Untitled (1999-2003) in Alsasua, Navarra, La Memoria de Urbasa (Tribute to those shot in the Civil War), Urbasa Park, Navarra, Point of light and balance / Argi izpia eta oreka (1979-2003), Public University of Navarra (UPNA), Pamplona, Navarra and Virgin with child (2011), Iesu Church, San Sebastián.

Individual Exhibitions

1975, San Telmo Museum, San Sebastián (Sculpture and engraving with López Arigita)
1976, C.A.N. Culture Exhibition Room, Pamplona
1979, Axular bookshop, Vitoria
1980, Aritza gallery, Bilbao
1981, Ikusmira gallery, Pasajes de San Juan, Guipúzcoa
1982, Windsor Kulturgintza, Bilbao
1983, Egam gallery, Madrid
1984, Windsor Kulturgintza, Bilbao
ARCO 84, Madrid (Sculpture and painting with Iñaki de la Fuente)
1986, Dieciséis gallery, San Sebastián
1987, Gaspar gallery, Rentería (Guipúzcoa) (Sculpture and painting José Luis Longarón)
Huit Poissy gallery, París
Windsor Kulturgintza, Bilbao
1988, Evelio Gayubo gallery, Valladolid
1990, Navarra's Museum, Pamplona
1991, Miguel Marcos gallery, Madrid
1992, Gaspar exhibition room, Barcelona
Dieciséis gallery, San Sebastián
1993, Sanz Enea, Zarautz town hall Guipúzcoa
1994, Kribia gallery, Pamplona
1997, Windsor Kulturgintza, Bilbao
1999, «Contemporary Basque Art», Izura, Benabarra (with Juan Luis Goenaga)
Contemporary Art Museum "La Fábrica", Abarca de Campos, Palencia
2001, Altxerri, gallery San Sebastián
2003, Barjola Museum, Gijón
2005,»Ama lur, ama argi, ama», Art space «Itinerant gallery», Vitoria-Gasteiz
2006, Anthological exhibition, BBK exhibition room, Bilbao
2008, «The limits of matter», Metropolitan Cultural Center Tecla, L’Hospitalet de Llobregat, Barcelona
«The limits of matter», Citadel of Pamplona Pavilion, Navarra
2012, “Shapes against time”, Bilbao's Fine Arts Museum
2017, “material and formal cause”, Jorge Oteiza's foundation
2017, Vanguardia gallery Bilbao
2019, “Lantegi” Kubo-Kutxa exhibition room Donostia-San Sebastian

Links:

https://www.joseramonanda.com/

https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Ram%C3%B3n_Anda

https://esculturas.pamplona.es/VerPagina.asp?IdPag=183&Idioma=1