Quirós, 1958

Adolfo Manzano


Born in Bárzana de Quirós, 1958. He lived and worked in Oviedo. He’s part of those always in contact with the new trends of art abroad when appropriate, always keeping in mind the environment where he lives, his roots. It is enough to remember, not only the frequency of the use of his mother tongue in the titles of his works, but also for the care with which he integrates his work in the landscape and culture of his land, as in the installation carried out in 1992 in Mount Monsacro, Asturias.


Trained at the School of Arts and Crafts in Oviedo, he began the practice of sculpture next to Daniel Gutiérrez. Interested in the capabilities of the materials and the constructivist formulation, his first works have already manifested a primary interest in the object and the game of scales. He then investigated other languages ​​that brought his work to maturity, where the link with the symbolism of objects was present, their decontextualization and their ability to dialogue with space from an optic that does not disregard irony or social criticism.

Adolfo Manzano incorporates all kinds of materials into his minimalist language: wood and chipboard, iron and aluminum, wax, paraffin, enamel, paper and photography (as in his work entitled ‘human life’, altarpiece composed of 21 photographs).