Pedro Osés Navaz — Mixed media on paper (1994) — Pamplona School

A work with a marked symbolic weight created by Pedro Osés Navaz in 1994, in which the human figure and nature merge into a single image. The artist's characteristic graphic language—poised between painting, drawing, and illustration—constructs a scene of serene appearance whose interpretation revolves around gestation, birth, and the continuity of life.

Nature as an extension of the body

A naked female figure rests amidst an extensive surface of small blue flowers. Growing from her abdomen is a plant with large roots, leaves, and flowers that vertically occupies the center of the composition. The image thus transforms a seemingly bucolic motif into an allegory: the human body and the vegetable world cease to be separate realities and participate in the same process of growth.

This reading finds exceptional support on the reverse of the piece itself, which preserves a handwritten inscription referring to the meaning of the painting and to the “birth of something she carries inside.” Without needing to alter its original title—Untitled—the annotation allows for the understanding of gestation as one of the conceptual keys of the composition.

Between painting, illustration, and narrative

Pedro Osés developed an extensive career as a painter, draftsman, and illustrator in parallel, and this coexistence between disciplines is particularly perceptible here. The black outlines that define the leaves and the figure, the anatomical simplification, the relatively flat chromatic surfaces, and the narrative clarity bring the image closer to the language of illustration and comics without abandoning its painterly condition. Osés was, in fact, one of the Navarrese artists who early on incorporated resources from Pop art and graphic culture into contemporary figuration.

Nature is also a recurring element in his trajectory. Studies dedicated to his production point to the contrast he establishes between the disorder of the city and the search for refuge in vegetation, trees, and landscape. In this 1994 work, that link acquires a particularly poetic solution: nature no longer surrounds the human being, but literally is born from them.

The date is equally significant. During that same year, a few months after the creation of this piece, the Gustavo de Maeztu Museum in Estella presented a solo exhibition of Pedro Osés, held between November and December of 1994.

Technical Sheet

• Author: Pedro Osés Navaz (Pamplona, 1942).
• Title: Untitled.
• Date: April 16, 1994.
• Technique and Support: Mixed media on cardstock, with linear drawing and pictorial application of color.
• Dimensions: approx. 39.3 × 34 cm.
• Signature: Signed “Pedro Osés” in the lower left corner.
• Inscriptions: On the reverse, numbering “278”, handwritten title “SIN TÍTULO”, measurements, and handwritten text related to the interpretation of the work.
• Provenance: Private collection.
• Condition: Good general condition, with signs of age and handling visible in the photographs, especially on the reverse.
• Inspection Guarantee: 30-day guaranteed return period to inspect the work in person and verify its quality and condition.

The Workshop Note

There is something especially attractive about this small work: the ease with which a seemingly simple image ends up revealing a much more intellectual construction. The reclining woman, the blue flowers, and the plant emerging from her abdomen turn the landscape into a metaphor for birth, but Osés avoids any excessive solemnity through a direct, almost illustrator-like drawing style and a luminous palette.

It is also a piece very representative of that frontier that Pedro Osés traversed for decades between painting, drawing, and graphic narrative. Its date, 1994, also places it in a well-documented moment of his production and in the same year as his solo exhibition at the Gustavo de Maeztu Museum. An intimate, unique work with an immediate reading, yet open enough to continue revealing meanings when observed closely.