I was never rigorously abstract or rigorously figurative.
I have tried to be rigorously Oswaldo Vigas1
Oswaldo Vigas has one of the most solid and successful trajectories of contemporary Venezuelan and Latin-American plastic art. He excelled in painting, sculpture, ceramics, engraving and muralism, he studied medicine and graduated as a pediatrician, but Vigas never abandoned his passion for painting and began to develop the theme to which he will return again and again during his career: The Brujas (Witches), compositions full of mystery and unreality that present a surreal vision of the woman.2
In 1952, he studied engraving and lithography at the School of Fine Arts and it was during this period that Arq. Villanueva commissioned several mosaic murals for the Project of Integration of the Arts of the University City of Caracas, in which also participated, Fernand Léger, Victor Vassarely, Jean Arp, Antoine Pevsner, Baltasar Lobo and Alexander Calder, the project was declared a World Cultural Heritage by UNESCO in 2000.3
After going through an informal period in the early 1960s, in the middle of this decade he returned to figuration, although distanced from conventional figurativism. In 1962 he represents Venezuela at the Venice Biennale.
In 1964 he returned to Venezuela, in 1990 the Sofia Imber Museum of Contemporary Art organized a retrospective with more than 200 of his works, including paintings, sculptures, tapestries, ceramics, jewelry and handicrafts. In 1992 participates in the XXVI International Prize of Contemporary Art of Monaco, receiving the first prize with Crucifixion VII. In 1999, the Iberian-American FIA Art Fair chose him as an artist honored.4
The painting of beams during its last years was characterized by a 'reduced figuration'. The funds became simpler and his figures primitive, but his work continued with the usual intensity until his last days.
Oswaldo Vigas stood out as a painter, sculptor and his works of graphic character and fabrics are accompanied by his talents of ceramist and muralist. In 2006, within the framework of the 10th anniversary of Galería Medicci, he held his individual exhibition number 100 with the individual exhibition "Creatures of Awe". At the same time, Galeria Medicci published its first Poem "My God Tutelar" with unpublished poems and illustrations of its own authorship.
Deserving of a great number of national and international prizes, decorations and other recognitions, Master Oswaldo Vigas enjoyed the admiration and respect both nationally and internationally for a trajectory of seven more decades of constant work and search for excellence.
Oswaldo Vigas died in Caracas in 2014 at the age of 90 years.1
References
1 Biografía. Fundación Oswaldo Vigas
http://oswaldovigasworks.com/bio/
2 Vigas, Oswaldo. La web de las Biografías
www.mcnbiografias.com/app-bio/do/show?key=vigas-oswaldo
3 Oswaldo Vigas. Wikipedia
https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oswaldo_Vigas
4 Vigas, Oswaldo. Wikihistoria del Arte Venezolano.
http://vereda.ula.ve/wiki_artevenezolano/index.php/Vigas,_Oswaldo
5 Oswaldo Vigas: The Venezuelan Painter Whom History Should Remember
(Agosto 16, 2015)
http://www.forbes.com/sites/abinlot/2015/08/16/oswaldo-vigas-the-venezuelan-painter-who-history-should-remember/#10834b086782