Torso masculino, Circa 2000

Jose Casamayor  

José Casamayor began, at the age of eight, in the disciplines of drawing and painting, when he attended classes taught by the Granada-born watercolorist Juan de Dios Morcillo at the Vélez-Málaga art school. There he has as companions the painter Evaristo Guerra and the poet, playwright and painter, Joaquín Lobato. Despite entering the world of art through drawing and painting, Casamayor will soon direct his creations -in a self-taught way- towards the field of sculpture, experimenting in his first works with the technique of clay modeling.

The professional career of this artist began in 1976, the year in which he held his first individual exhibition in the Exhibition Hall of the Caja de Ahorros Provincial de Vélez-Málaga. From then on, other exhibitions -both individual and collective- followed, mostly hosted in different towns in the province of Malaga. In 1996 he exhibited for the first time outside of Spain, in a group show in Brussels (Belgium), a city where he will periodically exhibit his creations again. Casamayor's work has also been exhibited in other parts of Spain such as Madrid, Bilbao, San Sebastián, Zaragoza, Barcelona, Tarragona, Lleida or Seville, as well as in Italy. José Casamayor has won numerous awards for his work; In addition, throughout his professional career, he has received several honorable mentions. He has also participated in various art fairs that have taken place in cities such as Madrid, Granada, Barcelona, Seville, Marbella, Santander, Belgium, London, Las Vegas and San Francisco. The work of this Veleño artist can be recognized by the use of a series of elements - ropes, knots and screws carved in stone - that are present in a large part of his production. Among the themes chosen for his sculptures, window representations predominate , of the female body or animals -especially horses- that he carves in calatorao stone, limestone that he personally chooses in the quarry and that he chisels directly without the help of previous scale models. Through different polishes, it achieves a black marble appearance and different textures that imitate iron, fabric and wood.

In addition to the creation of sculptural works in stone, wood or bronze, in which he mixes classical and surreal elements, Casamayor has also dedicated himself to experimenting with painting or collage.

His sculptural work is both in the hands of private collectors and exhibited in public spaces. Some of his public sculptures can be seen in places like Vélez-Málaga, Málaga, Nerja, Benamocarra, Benalmadena, Torre del Mar, Guadix, Arenas, Zaragoza, Logroño, Gerona or Calitri, in Itali.