Julio Gonzalez

Do you own a piece by Julio Gonzalez and would you like to know more about the work and its value? Our Experts will carry out a free appraisal of your sculpture, provide you with an estimate of the market price, and help you to sell it at the best price.

Status, price and estimation of the artist Julio Gonzalez

Price of a sculpture: 300 – 3,200,000 €.

Price of a drawing: 150 – 34,230 €.

Price of a painting: 2,500 – 32,750 €.

Estimation of a print: 220 – 3,360 €.

The beginnings of Julio Gonzalez

Julio Gonzalez was a Spanish surrealist goldsmith, sculptor and painter born in Barcelona on 21 September 1876. He died in Arcueil, France on 27 March 1942. His father was a famous ironworker and goldsmith from Barcelona. Julio works with him during the day and takes evening classes in drawing and painting at the Fine Arts School in Barcelona. When his father died in 1896, Julio and his older brother Juan took over the family foundry.

The following year, the two brothers were regular visitors to the Barcelona cabaret “Els Quatre Gats” (The Four Cats), where Julio met artists such as Joaquin Torres Garcia and Picasso. These encounters sealed the destiny of the young craftsman who travelled twice to Paris at this time.

Julio Gonzalez and Parisian life

In 1900, the Gonzalez family settled for a time in Paris in the bustling Montparnasse district. Julio devoted himself almost exclusively to pastel and painted female portraits. He worked assiduously with Picasso, who painted a portrait of him during a stay in Barcelona in 1902. Julio’s work is strongly inspired by Gauguin’s works, Rodin’s sculptures, Puvis de Chavannes and his friend Picasso’s blue period.

The artist is an active member of the community of Spanish painters living in Paris and participates in the Salons. He will never return to his native country. The death of his brother in 1908 upset him to the point that he created nothing for a year. In 1900, he took up his pencil again and met the woman who would become his wife and the mother of his daughter.

When war broke out, he took an important part in the life of the Salon d’Automne and presented his works and jewellery at the Salon des Indépendants. Then he opened an art and jewellery shop on Boulevard Raspail where he sold many of his drawings and pastels which helped him to provide for his family’s financial needs during this difficult period.

Julio Gonzalez and sculpture

After the war, Julio Gonzalez took a close interest in the different ways of working metal. His path then branches off towards sculpture. He is employed in the Renault factories and works on welding. In 1922, he presented his first solo exhibition in a gallery in rue Bonaparte, where he showed all his work, from his drawings to his goldsmith’s pieces.

An intense collaboration with Picasso was not long in coming. Julio participates in his friend’s sculptural and cubist creations thanks to remarkable casting techniques, which Picasso admires.

Having rubbed shoulders with the father of Cubism, Gonzalez found his personal style around 1929 and created his most important sculptures, such as Don Quixote, which have the particularity of “using the void to create volume”. Today he is considered by art historians to be “the founder of modern iron sculpture”.

Appraise and sell a painting by Julio Gonzalez

If you own a Julio Gonzalez painting or any other sculpture, ask for a free estimate via our online form.

You will then be contacted by a member of our team of experts and auctioneers to give you an independent view of the market price of your painting. In the event of a sale, our specialists will also advise you on the various options available to sell your work at the best price.