#AtoZChallenge: Xavier Vilató i Ruiz (Picasso)

Xavier is the Catalan spelling of Javier, just so you know.

Xavier Vilató was Pablo Picasso’s nephew. His mother was Picasso’s sister, Lola. In 1909, Lola Picasso had married a psychiatrist, Juan Bautista Vilató Gómez, son of a professor of neurobiology from Barcelona. Together, they had six children, two of which were also artists. Xavier and José both escaped from being forced into the Spanish army during the Spanish Civil War by going to France. There, Picasso helped them greatly.

Lola lived to be 74 years old. She died in 1958.

From the Museu Picasso in Barcelona’s website (translated):

Javier Vilató (Barcelona, 1921–París, 2000)

Familiar since his childhood with the art world, in Paris Javier Vilató -son of Picasso’s sister Lola and the Catalan neuropsychiatrist, Joan Baptista Vilató -submerged himself in the new way of living and feeling art brought forth by his uncle, fleeing from established parameters and seeking his own identity.

If a trait characterized the life and work of Vilató -beyond that of his attraction to Mediterranean light, which is made evident in his use of color-, is his interest, or rather, his gaze on his surroundings, often his immediate and intimate environment. Vilató was always a great portraitist, including his latest works which are sculptural portraits. Loved women, children, friends and pets -dogs, horses or insects- are depicted under the gaze of the portraitist, including everyday household objects such as fruits, pitchers or lamps. Subjects, all of them, which reflected his personal reflection on life in an open, energetic and passionate way.

From another article on the Museu Picasso Barcelona website about the nephews’ and Picasso‘s interests in printmaking (note that José Vilato went by J. Fín as an artist):

In 1939, J. Fín and Vilató were Spanish political refugees stranded on the beach of Argelès after the disaster of the Spanish Civil War. Their uncle Picasso took them from the camp in Argelès and brought them back to Paris with him. They spent several months there, before the outbreak of the Second World War. During their stay, Picasso brought them to the Lacourière studio, which is where the two young artists discovered the intaglio technique, which they would practice steadfastly. Each created his first engraving there. Only Vilató’s engraving is known today (of which only a single proof exists, presented here), as Fín’s has been lost. This taste for printmaking, for the time shared and for these masterful artisans’ savoir-faire was passed down to Xavier, the son of Vilató and representative of the third generation of this family of artists.