Madrid,
Halfway between symbolism and Canarian typism, between the attachment to what was its homeland and cosmopolitism, Nestor Martín-Fernández de la Torre deployed in its necessarily brief career (he lived between 1887 and 1938) a great talent for drawing and a deep interest both for nature and the sea and for the society of his time.
Very soon, in 1901, he moved to Madrid to form together with Rafael Hidalgo de Caviedes and know thoroughly the Prado collections, and not much later he went to London, where he was especially interested in the creations of Whistler and Rossetti. After that British stay, in 1907 he settled in Barcelona, where he continued his training, participated in international samples and was able to present his first individual: in the equestrian circle.
Two of his fundamental pictorial series would begin to take shape in that decade of the ten and their titles already advance their lyrical imprint: we refer to Atlantic poem and Earth’s poemthe two inspired by verses of Tomás Morales and in their own love for the landscape. And his work on canvas joined it with incursions into the scenery and decoration, especially in his native Canary Islands: for the Pérez Galdós Theater in Las Palmas, El Casino de Santa Cruz de Tenerife or the complex Canarian town, which did not see inaugurated. In this field, Dalí came to quote him as inspiration.
In collaboration with two centers in that region, the Nestor de las Palmas and Tea Museum. Tenerife Space of the Arts, the Reina Sofía Museum gives Martín-Fernández de la Torre the retrospective “Nestor Reencontrado”, which Juan Vicente Aliaga has curated and who wants to publicize its production between a broad audience, reviewing its approaches to modernism, decadentism and symbolism and a tendency towards sensuality that collided with the general standards of the painting of its time. That challenge had to do with what Earth’s poemunfinished set, barely exposed by its erotic content.
Both that series and Atlantic poemwhose eight canvases were shown, are characterized by their great formats and by the prominence given to the body, both the male and the female, which melted in compositions to which it endowed with fantasy and barochism, interspersing references to Masonry and the Canary Islands Flora and Fauna.
Eugenio D´ors, Lorca and Dalí and Paris appreciated at the time, where he lived a few years with his partner, the musician Gustavo Durán, led to his international takeoff. He would not return to Las Palmas until health, sentimental and economic problems promoted his return and with his early death his oblivion began.
The exhibition chronologically reviews its legacy, starting with some beginnings in which, while demonstrating its skill in the practice of drawing, it sought its identity. Under the teachings of Eliseu Meifrén made marinas; Under those of Hidalgo de Caviedes, sometimes family portraits and street scenes.
Among its first compositions stands out Adage (1903), an inquiry in the symbolist universe through the myth, sexualized, of Leda and the Swan. He also approached impressionism in Calle Mayor de Madrid (1904).
Immersed later in Catalan cultural life, he adopted a very alive palette in The sister of the roses (1908) and the Portrait of Enrique Granados (1909-1910). In Queen Sofia we also see Epitalamio or the weddings of Prince Nestor (1909), wide self -portrait where he presents two figures caught by the hand: his own and its transvestite and feminized version, as well as the piece of the same year THE GARDEN OF THE HESPERIDSinspired by the poem l’Atlàntida From Jacint Verdaguer, much appreciated when he was exposed in the Pares room, and linked to Burne-Jones in his tendency to curved lines.
He was interested in ambiguous and refined characters, which he showed ethereal and sensual and that allowed him to become a recognized artist, although not always praised, precisely because of his inclination for the decadent. His production evoked some literature with which he shared some features; His most daring work in that sense will be The seven vices (1913), homoerotic background, which accompanied a poem by Rubén Darío. It may also be self -portrayed in East (1912-1913), in the figure of the turban wrapped in a kiss.
The aforementioned series of Poems He made them throughout his life. They responded to a will with a lot of utopian: to lift a kind of chapel, the palace of the elements, where to present four large murals dedicated to the four stations and the four moments of the day, that is, the dawn, the noon, the twilight and the night.
They condense their fundamental features: a symbolism close to the first surrealism, allusions to the principles of Freemasonry, an exuberant eroticism and mostly homoerotic and an exaltation of the Canarian.
If in the eight fabrics that integrate Atlantic poem either The poem of the sea (1923) We observed fish with naked young people suspended in the waters, evoking sleep, nightmare, fear and pleasure, in the Earth’s poem Masonic symbolism and vast representation of sexuality through bodies that reconcile the female and masculine, again with the Canarian landscape as a backdrop.
It was also in his female images where this author showed how, beyond labels, he had consolidated his own style, although he was always aware of the importance of satisfying the market for his own survival.
To that end, the paintings, drawings and engravings respond in which he represented the Spanish woman dressed in traditional breasts of Maja or Manola, but unedified or show it submitted: the models of Mantillas (1915) o The garrotin (1928) offer, in fact, muscle. In this chapter we will also contemplate Holly lady (1914), symbolist air, or Marquise from Casa Maury (1931), close to Art Decó Cosmopolita.
It also collects this retrospective series of satyrs Mythologythat for his legendary theme he allowed him to capture the less easy to admit desires; gives those figures of a bold libidinosity present in gestures and looks. And some scenographic projects: their sketches for Witch love Failure, released at the Lara Theater in 1915, offers their most avant -garde version through spectral atmospheres far from the customary assemblies of the time.
Twelve years later, in 1927, he collaborated with the dancer Antonia Mercé, Argentinain Candil’s fandangowhich premiered with good reception in France and Germany. His frames are based on the photographic aesthetics of the new vision and the German expressionist cinema, which knew how to combine with tradition, as would later happen in production Trianaof the Spanish ballets of the aforementioned Mercé with music by Isaac Albéniz that, in 1929, was presented at the Opéra-Comique de Paris.
We will see a full innovation in The stranded sirenonly something prior to the civil war, in which Nestor Martín-Fernández added elements close to the surreal repertoire, such as the eye, the ear, the lips or the wings.
Another chapter to mention in his diverse work were the murals, which would have to serve their motto of achieving “a life surrounded by beauty.” From a young age he began to decorate family spaces, and in 1909 he created his first significant set of these pieces for society El Tibidabo, which included the ceiling THE GARDEN OF THE HESPERIDS. When he settled in Madrid, he decorated his study with another mural that textually incorporated a maximum symbolist, “it is necessary that we make a lifetime a work of art”, together with Renaissance details inspired by Botticelli and Miguel Ángel. Those who made for the Pérez Galdós Theater present classic figures such as Apollo and the muses or sensual ephebos surrounded by fruits and birds, and the last one that carried out the cobija the aforementioned casino of Santa Cruz de Tenerife (1932-1936).
Nestor believed in the unity of the arts and in the role of these to raise refined atmospheres; Also surely in its multiple options to challenge the typism from within.
“Néstor Reencontrado”
National Museum of Art Center Reina Sofía. MNCARS
C/ Santa Isabel, 52
Madrid
From May 14 to September 8, 2025
