Javier Cabada


Javier Cabada is a Spanish-American artist who paints colorful, abstract works. He has been exhibited in galleries and museums such as the Royal Institute of Thailand in Bangkok, Thailand, the Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow, and the Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C.

Background

Cabada was born on October 25, 1931, in Barcelona, Spain. He studied painting at the Escuela Nacional Superior Autónoma de Bellas Artes in Lima, Peru under Oscar Allain Cotera. He also studied at the Corcoran College of Art and Design, and the Ecola Massana in Barcelona. He has lived in the United States since the early 1960s and attained U.S. citizenship in 1976. He currently lives in Washington D.C.

Art

Cabada works almost exclusively as a painter, particularly acrylic on canvas. He counts Richard Serra, Francis Bacon, Frank Gehry, Jean-Michel Basquiat, and Alberto Giacometti among his artistic influences, not only for their style, but also for their process and perfectionist natures. He experimented with several different styles before settling on acrylic on canvas, and his style has also shifted considerably. His earlier work was considerably more figurative than his later abstract works, and was generally cartoonish and whimsical in style. Many of his early subjects were flowers, dancers, and portraits, especially portraits of classical composers and musicians. Among them are a large acrylic painting of Frédéric Chopin, which was exhibited in the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington D.C. from 1973–1983, and a portrait of Elvis Presley which was featured on the front cover of Music Educator's Journal in 1970.

Public collections

Cabada's works are in the following collections: