Xul Solar was an Argentinian painter, writer and sculptor, who represented Surrealism movement. His paintings of mystic worlds and alternate universes are filled with floating cities, arcane symbols, angels, winged horses, pyramids, snakes and frightening half-breeds of airplanes and people. Xul Solar was also the originator of imaginary languages.
Background
Ethnicity:
His father was of Baltic German origin and his mother was Italian.
Xul Solar was born on December 14, 1887 in San Fernando, Argentina. He was the son of Elmo Schulz Riga and Agustina Solari.
Education
Initially, Xul Solar was educated in Buenos Aires, first as a musician, then, since 1905, as an architect at the University of Buenos Aires (although he never completed his architectural studies).
In 1912, after briefly studying architecture, Solar undertook a trip to Europe, disembarking in London. During his long stay in Europe, he lived in various towns — Paris, Turin, Genoa, Marseilles, Zoagli, Florence, Milan and Munich. In Italy, he became friends with Emilio Pettoruti.
In 1920, he began to sign as Xul Solar and held his first exhibition in Milan along with the sculptor Arturo Martini. There, he exhibited oils, which followed the renovating currents of European art, mainly of Expressionism and Fauvism, but always keeping within a mystical spiritualism, materialised by an imaginative symbolism. The painter also exhibited watercolours, influenced by a certain interpretation of the arabesque, taken from Art Nouveau and geometric synthesis, which were close to abstraction. In his paintings, he always kept a visionary approach, even in those works, that relied more on conventions of figuration.
Xul's quest for universal harmony induced him to work for the improvement of human communication. In this sense, he spent years, creating languages, such as Neo-Creole — a mixture of modified forms of Spanish and Portuguese — and a universal language called Pan Lingua. These and other inventions, such as the panjogo — a sort of extremely complex chess — a modified Tarot or the piano with textured and coloured keys, corresponding to the different sounds, are related to the principles of astrology, to which he devoted much of his life.
Upon his return to Argentina in 1924, Xul held several exhibitions. The same year, he participated at the Salón Libre, held at Galería Witcomb. In those days, he made friends with the intellectual avant-garde group, that published Martín Fierro magazine, the staff of which he joined. He also befriended writers Oliverio Girondo, Macedonio Fernández and especially Jorge Luis Borges.
In 1929, Solar held his first solo exhibition in Buenos Aires at Amigos del Arte. In 1940, he carried out an exhibition at the same institution. In 1939, Xul initiated a project to establish a "universal club", which he called "Pan Klub" in Neo-Creole. His purpose was to create a type of salon for intellectuals and those of mutual interests, and inaugurated the club at his home.
Some time later, in 1951, the painter showed his works at Galería Guión and in 1953 at Galería Van Riel. The same year, in 1953, Solar worked on a series of watercolour projects and facades and, towards 1958, he worked on his "grafías plasti útiles" with which he elaborated a system of plastic writing.
In 1962, a year before his death, he had a major exposition at the Musée National d'Art Moderne in Paris.
Xul Solar had a strong interest in astrology, Buddhism and believed in rebirth.
Personality
Quotes from others about the person
"Xul took on the task of reforming the universe, of proposing on this earth a different order. For that, among other things, he changed the current numerical system of mathematics to use a duodecimal system, with which he painted his watercolors." — Jorge Luis Borges, a short-story writer