Constructive with Street and Fish

After living in Europe from 1891 to 1934, Joaquín Torres García returned to Montevideo to spend his final years promoting modern art. In Uruguay, Torres García continued to exhibit, lecture and publish widely, as a way of disseminating his views on a universal tradition of art rooted in the indigenous cultures of the Americas. "Constructivo con calle y gran pez", created three years before the artist's death, is an excellent example of his constructive repertoire, in which symbols and schematic figures follow a geometric order and are the subject of a synthesis of color, form, line and space. The work depicts an abstract urban scene in a grid-like composition, with multiple planes populated by people in motion engaged in the usual activities of city life.