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As a faithful follower of the avant-garde, Nicolás de Lekuona did not develop an exclusionary artistic practice. Instead, he shifted between painting and photography, and he made beautiful photomontage-collages, in addition to a considerable number of drawings.

Despite the tone of the era, which relates this work with other Spanish artists who admired Max Ernest (from González Bernal to Ismael de la Serna), this oil is highly representative of his own poetics, studded with references to the origin of creation, perhaps as a metaphor of the origin of art. At the same time, it also contains allusions to the Basque landscape. Painted in cool tones, which accentuates the alienated, dreamlike sensation, it depicts two beings made of different materials whose bodies connect and merge at the shoulder, with cavities through which the landscape peeks out, developing a proliferating vegetative motion and causing a strong sense that is at once disturbing and harmonious. The hand that touches refers to subtle touches, a topic that is dear to Lekuona.

The painting was acquired by the museum for the 1983 exhibition entitled Nicolás de Lekuona. Paintings and Drawings, whose catalogue this author personally put together.

Nicolás de Lekuona was trained in Ordizia, San Sebastián and Madrid and was virtually an autodidact, absorbing a host of books and magazines, poetry, essays and theory of art, literature and more. Because of his avant-garde leanings, he connected with the Grupo Norte of GATEPAC in San Sebastián and with the Escuela de Vallecas in Madrid.

Between 1933 and 1935, a series of projects shared with Jorge Oteiza in Madrid and Gipuzkoa resulted in the exhibition painting-sculpture-photograph. balenciaga-lekuonaoteiza (sic), held in September 1934 in the Kursaal gallery in San Sebastián. This exhibition placed in them the sights of the local critics, who pointed to Lekuona as the most ground-breaking. He exhibited 20 photographs which summarised his career since 1932-no one's street, boy, self photograph, etc.-, a photomontage, eleven paintings-shapes, flat shapes, etc.-and eight drawings.

His painting had changed from the Expressionism of them, the detritus to draw closer to late Cubism in the School of Paris, introduced into Spain by Benjamín Palencia, and thereafter it veered towards Surrealism. By the time Lekuona made the painting at hand, his intense communion with Oteiza had become a thing of the past because of the latter's journey to Latin America with Balenciaga. Nor was he living in the madrí (Madrid) which had nurtured him, in the milieus of the sculptor Alberto Sánchez, Ramón Gómez de la Serna and of many others. At that time, he was working as a building surveyor for the architect Florentino Mocoroa in San Sebastián and was in contact with Basque intellectuals like Antonio Odriozola and Lauaxeta, who modernised Basque poetry (executed in 1937).

He designed another exhibition with an equivalent number of photomontages, photographs, paintings and drawings which was never held.

Nicolás de Lekuona died in a bombardment when he was working as a stretcher-bearer at the front supporting Franco in Fruiz (Bizkaia). Despite his brief life, he left an oeuvre which vividly stands out on the Basque art scene. [Adelina Moya Valgañón]

Selected bibliography

• Cat. Nicolás de Lecuona. Zaragoza, Caja de Ahorros de la Inmaculada, 1981.
• Nicolás de Lekuona : pinturas y dibujos [Folleto]. Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, Bilbao, 1983. N° cat. 53
• Arte y artistas vascos de los años 30 = 30 urtearen hamarkadako euskal artea eta artistak [Cat. exp.]. Vitoria-Gasteiz, Eusko Jaurlaritza = Gobierno Vasco, 1986.
• Nikolas Lekuona, 1913-1937. San Sebastián, Sociedad Guipuzcoana de Ediciones y Publicaciones, Obra Cultural de la Caja de Ahorros Municipal de San Sebastián, 1988. p. 55.
• Tesoros del Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao : pintura, 1400-1939 [Cat. exp.]. Madrid, El Viso, 1989. pp. 196-197, n° cat. 81.
• El Surrealismo en España, 1924-1939 [Cat. exp.]. Madrid, Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, 1994. pp. 204, 364, n° cat. 100.
• Moya Valgañon, Adelina. Orígenes de la vanguardia artística en el País Vasco : Nicolás Lekuona y su tiempo. Madrid, Electra, 1994. p. 127.
• Kortadi Olano, Edorta. Euskal margolariak Aurrezki Kutxen bildumetan IV = Pintores vascos en las colecciones de las Cajas de Ahorros IV. Bilbao, Bilbao Bizkaia Kutxa ; Gipuzkoa Donostia Kutxa ; Caja Vital Kutxa, 1994. p. 34.
• El surrealismo y la guerra civil española [Cat. exp.]. Teruel, Diputación Provincial ; Museo de Teruel, 1998. p. 127, 142.
• Zugaza, Miguel ... [et al.]. Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao : maestros antiguos y modernos. Bilbao, Fundación Bilbao Bizkaia Kutxa = Bilbao Bizkaia Kutxa Fundazioa, 1999. p. 214.
• De Picasso a Bacon : arte contemporáneo en las colecciones del Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao [Cat. exp.]. Segovia, Museo de Arte Contemporánea Esteban Vicente, 1999. p. 87-87.
• Entre la figuración y la abstracción : arte contemporáneo en las colecciones del Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao [Cat. exp.]. Pamplona, Museo de Navarra, 1999. pp. 70-71.
• Zugaza, Miguel ... [et al.]. Maestros antiguos y modernos en las colecciones del Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao. Bilbao, Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2001. p. 135.
• Nicolas de Lekuona : imagen y testimonio de la vanguardia [Cat. exp.]. Vitoria-Gasteiz ; Madrid, Artium, Arte Garaikideko Euskal Zentro-Museoa = Centro-Museo Vasco de Arte Contemporáneo ; Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, 2003. p. 165 (Con el título Seres surreales en un bosque).
• Montané, J. L. "Nicolás de Leku-ona", Artes Plásticas, n° 82. 2004. p. 25.
• Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao : guía. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2006. p. 182.
• Musée des Beaux Arts de Bilbao : guide. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2006. p. 182.
• Bilbao Fine Arts Museum : guide. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2006. p. 182.
• Guía Artistas Vascos. Bilbao, Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2008. pp. 118-119.
• Gida Euskal Artistak. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Eder Museoa, 2008. pp. 118-119.
• Novecentismo y Vanguardia, 1910-1936 : en la colección del Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao [Cat. exp.]. Bilbao, Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2009. pp. 296-297, n° cat. 99.
• Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao : guía. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2011. p. 182, n° cat. 129.
• Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa : gida. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2012. p. 182, n° cat. 129.
• Guide Basque Artists. Bilbao, Bilbao Fine Arts Museum, 2012. pp. 118-119, n° cat. 62b.
• Musée des Beaux Arts de Bilbao : guide. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2014. p. 182.
• Bilbao Fine Arts Museum : guide. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2014. p. 182.
• Irudi fantastikoa = La imagen fantástica [Cat. exp.]. San Sebastián, Kutxa Fundazioa, 2014. s.p., il.
• 110 Años 110 Obras [Cat. exp.]. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2018. pp. 254-255, sin n° cat.
• 110 Years 110 Works [Cat. exp.]. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2018. pp. 254-255, sin n° cat.
• 110 Ans 110 Oeuvres [Cat. exp.]. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2018. pp. 254-255, sin n° cat.
• 110 Urte 110 Artelan [Cat. exp.]. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2018. pp. 254-255, sin n° cat.
• Bilboko Museoaren alfabetoa = El alfabeto del Museo de Bilbao = The alphabet of the Bilbao Museum = L'alphabet du Musée de Bilbao [Cat. exp.]. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2018. pp. 321-322, 325-327, 329, n° cat. 183.
• Después del 68 : arte y prácticas artísticas en el País Vasco, 1968-2018 [Cat. exp.]. Bilbao, Bilboko Arte Ederren Museoa-Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, 2018. p. 337, il.