The Art and World of Luis Quintanilla. This retrospective web gallery features selections from the life’s work of the Spanish artist, Luis Quintanilla. (1893-1978) As organized and arranged by the artist's son, Paul Quintanilla.

Waiting at the Shore, by Paul Quintanilla. A biography of Luis Quintanilla
At Barnes and Noble, Amazon, and Sussex Academic Press.
British Amazon. For phone numbers check the Press site.
Or order it from your neighborhood bookstore.

Paul's Books

The Murals

A Little About His Murals

Love Peace Hate War

Don Quixote in the Heartland

Studies

Los Otros Guernicas

Portraits

Portraits of the Family

Portraits of Friends

The Portraits of Writers as How They
See Themselves

Hollywood Personalities

The New Yorker Profiles

Portraits of the Artist

Companions in Jail

And Fascists

Drawings and Engravings

The Etchings of Madrid Life and Street Scenes

Jail from the Inside

The Drawings of the War

Franco's Black Spain

New York Drawings and Engravings

Studies and Sketchbooks

Still Lifes

The 1940's

The 1950's

Landscapes and Interiors

The 1950's

Quintanilla Photographs

A Little About Quintanilla (1893-1978)

Starting out as a Cubist under the influence of his friend, Juan Gris, Quintanilla eventually became a prominent Spanish draftsman and muralist. Though he would have far preferred to be left alone to paint in peace without engaging in politics he was eventually drawn into the tumultuous affairs of his times. In 1931 he and Juan Negrin, the Premier of the Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War, put the flag of the Republic up on the Royal Palace in Madrid ensuring that the revolution which ousted the king would remain bloodless. In October of 1934 Quintanilla started a prison term lasting eight months, four days, and three hours for hosting, in his studio, the revolutionary committee of the October revolt. As has happened on other occasions when a prominent artist has found himself in jail, the world's intellectual community rallied to his aid. Ernest Hemingway and John Dos Passos circulated the petitions and organized the protests in the United States, Andre Malraux in France, and Lady Margo Asquith, wife of the former Prime Minister, performed the same service in Britain. And a show of his Madrid street scene etchings took place at the Pierre Matisse Gallery in New York with a catalog by Hemingway and Dos Passos. This show introduced him to the United States. When the Spanish Civil War started in July, 1936, Quintanilla helped lead the attack on the Montana Barracks which saved Madrid for the government. He was made the commander of the barracks at the start of the war and led men in action on the streets of Madrid, Toledo, and in the Guadarrama Mountains. In the spring of 1937 he was removed from these and other duties by Juan Negrin and commissioned to do a set of drawings of the war. These were shown first in 1938 at the Barcelona Ritz and then in the Museum of Modern Art in New York with a catalog by Hemingway. With the fall of the Spanish Republic in 1939 he was forced into an exile which lasted more than 37 years, living first in New York and then in Paris. A year following the death of Spain's dictator, General Francisco Franco, Quintanilla returned to Madrid where he spent the remaining two years of his life. He died at the age of 85.

Paul Quintanilla

See also Chronology of Quintanilla's Life and Work

Los Otros Guernicas: a DVD hour long documentary on the Love Peace Hate War murals.