Antonio de Felipe

Antonio de Felipe was born in Valencia in 1965. Ever since a very young age he has felt an artistic drive that led him to earn a fine arts degree at the University of Valencia. In 1996 he moved to Madrid where he has his studio.

The work of Antonio de Felipe is a constant source of fascination and surprises. It is a great pleasure to witness how the artist's ingenious world of ideas and his sense of humour are constantly evolving. His subject worlds form a surprising genre blend of striking contrasts, a linking of series characters, classical art and commercialism side by side with contemporary icon worship.

Antonio de Felipe has developed his extensive work in different series like, Las Vacas Logotipos and Popsport among others. In the serie Cinemaspop Antonio de Felipe has painted portraits of brilliant actors whose icon status is secure. Two of them are Audrey Hepburn and Greta Garbo, seen against a wide range of backgrounds where the artist pays tribute to the great masters – either Picasso's brutal Guernica or space figures reminiscent of Miró. As a third, Marilyn Monroe, parts her ruby lips downstage.

Playing with the stereotypical language of the advertising world is the distinguishing characteristic of his work. One example of this can be seen in the paraphrase on Diego Velásquez famous Las Meninas, Spanish for 'The Maids of Honour', painted in 1656. Instead of the glass of cold, perfumed water in the original, he places a Fanta soft drink in the hand of the young Spanish princess Margarita.

Antonio de Felipe has participated in over seventy solo exhibitions both in Spain and abroad, and in many other collective exhibitions, such as in La Casa de Vacas in Madrid, Museu Picasso in Barcelona, Museo de la Ciudad in Valencia, Bilbao Bizkaia Kutxa (BBK) Foundation and at the Soma Museum of Art in Seoul.