Anzo

JOSÉ IRANZO ALMONACID, "ANZO" (Valencia, 1931 - 2006).
Untitled.
Silkscreen on paper. Final art / colour proof. Published by the Ibero-Swiss printing house.
Presents dry stamp of the Ibero-Swiss printing house.
Measurements: 75 x 56 cm.
In Spain, the Ibero-Swiss company hosted the main Spanish artists from the mid-1960s to the 1990s. The serigrapher José Llopis made this firm an indisputable reference in terms of artistic printing. From artists linked to pop art, optical art and geometric art to Zóbel and Tàpies, as well as artists with a clear political commitment such as Renau, Genovés, Equipo Crónica and Equipo Realidad, they all found Ibero-Suiza's silkscreen printing to be an ideal technique for their projects: they liked its industrial character, its procedures, the effects and nuances obtained, and the affinity of all this with the resources of the media.
Anzo entered the San Carlos School of Arts and Crafts in Valencia in 1945, and in 1949 he went to Barcelona, where he studied architecture. He had solo and group exhibitions since 1961 and his work became well known in Spain as well as in the rest of Europe and the United States. Along with Joan Genovés, he was one of the main renovators of Valencian art, and his work was described as social art. He cultivated various derivations of pop art, and for a time he worked on the incorporation of images from advertising, television and cinema. Later he focused on the interpretation of simplified advertising images based on constructive elements, purist in character and with a certain disalienating intention. In 1997 his hometown, Utiel, dedicated a tribute exhibition to him, and in 2003 he received the Plastic Arts Award from the Generalitat Valenciana. In 2009 the University of Valencia paid tribute to him by exhibiting his works.