González, Julio

González, Julio (b Barcelona, 21 Sept. 1876; d Arcueil, nr. Paris, 27 Mar. 1942). Spanish sculptor, draughtsman, metalworker, and painter, active mainly in France, the leading pioneer in the use of iron as a sculptural medium. He learnt to work metals under his father, a goldsmith and sculptor, but his early career was spent mainly as a painter. In about 1900 he moved to Paris and formed a lifelong friendship with Picasso, whom he had earlier met in his native Barcelona. He initially supported himself mainly by making metalwork and jewellery, and it was not until the late 1920s, when he was already 50, that he devoted himself wholeheartedly to sculpture and turned to welded metal as a material. His best-known work, Montserrat (1937, Stedelijk Mus., Amsterdam), is a fairly naturalistic piece, showing a woman with a child in her arms, and commemorates the suffering of the people of Spain in the Civil War (Montserrat is Spain's holy mountain). More usually, however, his sculptures are semi-abstract, as in his series of Cactus People, formidable pieces with some of Picasso's savage humour. González's work had great influence, notably on Picasso, to whom he taught the techniques of iron sculpture, and on a generation of British and American artists exemplified by Reg Butler and David Smith. His brother Joan González (1868–1908) was a draughtsman and painter.