Background
Piña Torres was born in Barcelona, Spain on 24 February 1883 and died in Montevideo on 11 June 1994.
Piña Torres was born in Barcelona, Spain on 24 February 1883 and died in Montevideo on 11 June 1994.
She was known as "Doña Manolita" in Uruguay. Piña Torres"s art, along with her husband"s, has been collected by Emilio Ellena. Ellena describes her art as creative and beautiful, but Piña Torres stopped painting after she was married.
She felt that although she had stopped painting herself, that her opinion on art was always welcome.
She may have continued to do some art, since there is a record of a master quality woodcut in a book, Notes on Art by Torres Garcia (1913). She was known to help artists who were suffering from political persecution.
Piña Torres also refused to move back to Barcelona because of the crimes against art that were committed there, such as destroying frescoes. She is also the oldest verified person to have ever lived in Uruguay.
In 1951, Piña Torres created a group in Montevideo, called MAOTIMA (standing for the names of the participants, Manolita, Otilia, Iphigenia and Maria Angelica) which was dedicated to working on embroidered tapestries.
Piňa Torres was a tireless collector of her husband"s work and later helped promote much of his formerly unseen art She also inventoried his work, a list of over 350 pieces of art Piña Torres set up the foundation to support the Museo Torres Garcia and helped found the museum which was initially opened on 29 July 1953.
The museum went through a long, difficult history until the government of Uruguay stabilized and the museum was inaugurated in its current form in 1986.
Piña Torres was credited with enthusiasm and strength in working towards the creation of the museum. In addition to creating the foundation and the museum, she also set up an archive to document his life"s work.
She was honored in 2000 by the Cultural Center Foundation, Caixa Terrassa. Ellena, Emilio; Valenzuela, Pedro (2000).
Homenatge a Manolita Piña de Torres García (in Spanish).
Centre Cultural, Fundacio Caixa Terrassa.