Monument to Máter-Ínsula

Las Palmas de Gran Canaria · Category: Art · Subcategory: Sculpture · Year: 1956 · Authors: Juan Márquez

With this sculpture, embodied in a corpulent female figure holding her child in her arms, Gran Canaria was symbolised. [...] It is indeed remarkable that the initiative came from the sculptor himself, Juan Márquez, who made it in 1956 and who also did not charge any fee for the work. In fact, the piece is a donation from the artist to the municipal corporation of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, in gratitude for the scholarship granted to him thirty years earlier to further his training in Paris.

Worked in artificial stone, [the piece] consists of a seated female nude who embraces a child covered with a shawl that falls down the sides of her body to swirl beneath the mother's feet. This approaches "indigenist" approaches, visible both in the facial features, with pronounced cheekbones, and in the representation of the body, with solid forms and wide hips. We recall the words the author expressed when defining his approach: "I have resolved it in modern forms with current features and profiles, with island accent and emotion (...) Canarian" .

Other considerations previously posed by the artist in earlier works are also evident, such as the representation of curved rhythms, successfully achieved by the bent position of the lower limbs, and that of rounded volumes. His characteristic geometric imprint was also not lacking.

In its conception, the originality stands out in the absence of a pedestal, placed flush with the ground, since what we could call its base does not exceed ten centimetres in height. It is regrettable that such novelty brought with it its deteriorated appearance. Accessible to anyone, it has therefore been an easy prey for insensitive people.

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