Suite Catalana, plate 1

Over the course of his career in painting, printmaking, and etching, Antoni Tàpies has created his own lexicon of symbols and marks to help communicate the broad range of influences in his work. These include, most significantly, his Catalan roots, as well as his involvement with the Parisian intellectual scene of the 1950s, meeting exponents of Art Informel like Jean Fautrier and Jean Dubuffet. Tàpies's abstract paintings are made with expressive blends of impasto, gestural brush strokes, often backwards hand-written script, and common materials such as soil and marble dust.