Nico Munuera
Nico Munuera
Nico Munuera’s artistic practice unfolds through a dimensional depth that extends beyond what is initially observed, for while it may seem to evoke a landscape-based idiom, his paintings never originate from cohesive referents, instead emerging from a polymorphic ecosystem of sensations and details drawn from the totality of his surroundings. Much like a subject who transforms from a tabula rasa into an identity shaped by multiple influences, Munuera’s painting asserts itself as a field open to the unexpected and to the fleeting intuition of each passing moment, distilled into the essentials of color and gesture within a microcosm that resists visual immediacy by articulating its own sensitive atlas. Working horizontally, Munuera forges a dialectical relationship between body and painting, dissolving the horizon as a conventional distance or varnishing point and situating his practice within the pictorial lineage of Abstract Expressionism, where presence becomes inseparable from the act of creation, free from any predetermined aspiration or conclusion. Intimately inspired by Eastern philosophies grounded in introspection and in the harmony of all things, Munuera’s work fundamentally reveals, in its minimal purity, a poetic way of both being and perceiving.
Nico Munuera (b. 1974, Lorca, Spain) lives and works in Valencia, Spain. Institutional solo exhibitions include MACE – Museo Arte Contemporáneo de Ibiza, Spain (2025); Fundación Marso, Mexico City (2019); Museo Patio Herreriano, Valladolid, Spain (2019); IVAM – Intitut Valencià d’Art Modern, Valencia, Spain (2017); Fundación Belondrade, Valladolid, Spain (2016), and Palacio de Cibeles, Madrid (2012), among others. Selected group exhibitions include Es Baluard Museu, Palma, Spain (2025); Centro del Carmen, Valencia, Spain (2025); Museum of Fine Arts of Murcia, Spain (2025); Palacio de los Águila, Ciudad Rodrigo, Spain (2022); Museo Patio Herreriano, Valladolid, Spain (2021 and 2013); Fundación Juan March, Museo de Cuenca, Madrid (2021); Cervantes Institute, Beijing, China (2018); Bancaja Foundation, Valencia, Spain (2018); Fondazione Giorgio Cini, Venice, Italy (2015); CAC – Centro de Arte Contemporáneo de Málaga, Spain (2015); MACA – Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Alicante, Spain (2015); MMOMA - Moscow Museum of Modern Art, Moscow (2011); CGAC - Galician Center of Contemporary Art, Santiago de Compostela, Spain (2011); Villa Bernasconi, Geneva, Switzerland (2011); and Gabarron Foundation, New York, USA (2007), to name a few. Munuera has received several awards and grants, including the Cultura Diario La Razón Award, Madrid (2024); the Alfonso Décimo Painting/Sculpture Prize, Murcia, Spain (2023); CAM Artistic Creation Grant, Berlin (2011); the Artistic Creation Grant, Casa Pintada Foundation, New York, USA (2007); and the Generación ’05 Prize, Fundación Cajamadrid (2005).
His work is included in prominent collections, including La Caixa Foundation Art Collection, Barcelona, Spain; IVAM – Instituto Valenciano de Arte Moderno, Spain; Barrié Foundation, A Coruña, Spain; Banco Sabadell Collection, Barcelona, Spain; Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Helga Alvear, Cáceres, Spain; Ministry of Culture Collection, Madrid; Patio Herreriano Museum Collection, Valladolid, Spain; Banco de España Art Collection, Madrid; Unicaja Foundation, Málaga, Spain; Copelouzos Family Art Museum, Greece; among others.