Gustavo Novoa (Chilean, born 1941) Original Oil Painting on Masonite (that was how it was catalogued at Doyle. It might be acrylic paint) Green Dark Mirror Hand signed G Novoa lower right Hand signed Novoa and inscribed with title verso Dimensions: 36 x 36 inches. Framed 42 1/2 x 42 1/2 inches. Provenance: Doyle New York Gustavo Novoa, Born 1941 in Santiago, Chile, He attended the Academy of Fine Arts. Novoa made his debut as an artist in the early 1960¹s selling oil painting, watercolors and crayon drawings on the streets of Paris, principally Montmartre. His first one-man show was sponsored by the Chilean Ambassador at the Maison de L¹Amerique Latin in 1961. The late Queen Victoria Eugenia of Spain sponsored his second show in Lausanne, Switzerland in 1962. Showing in galleries in the Faubourg St. Honore and the Salon de la Jeune Peinture. Novoa constructed a dream-like Naive feline jungle where the lions lies down with the zebras. Panthers and pandas share the shade with African monkeys and American raccoons and butterflies in a surrealist magic realism fantasy. Novoa became represented exclusively by the Wally Findlay Galleries in the early 1970s, and his one-man shows in New York, Paris, Palm Beach and Beverly Hills established him as a champion of ecology and wildlife preservation along with Henri Maik and Hunt Slonem. His animals were primitive and painted in lush and colorful Folk Art backgrounds. (Wally Findlay Galleries have shown him alongside many important artists including Gaston Sebire, Gen Paul, Jean Pierre Cassigneul, Jean Dufy, Nicola Simbari, Francois Gall, Michel Henry, Jules Rene Herve, Andre Gisson, Marcel Dyf, Dietz Edzard, Claude Venard, Elisee Maclet, Yolande Ardissone, Andre Hambourg, Paul Aizpiri, Constantine Kluge, Jacques Bouyssou, Le Pho, Henri Maik and Paul Aizpiri.) Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey commissioned him to do the poster and program for the circus that year. By 1971, Novoa¹s paintings had changed again. His Surrealist show "The Grand Tour" sent his animals prowling the major cities of the world, from the Spanish Steps in Rome to the Left Bank in Paris, through the Great Pyramids and back to Park Avenue in New York. It was perhaps the most surrealistic of Novoa's shows. On April 3, 1988, Prince Charles of England set a new record for Novoa¹s sales by auctioning one of his acrylic paintings at a benefit sale in Palm Beach. Novoa was received at the White House by Mrs. George Bush. Miami¹s Art Deco District had chosen Novoa¹s painting "The Carlyle Hotel" to be presented to the First Lady. The painting hangs in the President¹s Library. The prestigious Gallery 1-2-3 of El Salvador introduced Novoa at their Latin American Biennale exhibition in June of 1992. The Instituto Cultural de Santiago presented an impressive one-man show in August, 1992. His first exhibition in Chile, where the press named him "Painter of a Lost Paradise". Sponsored by Avensa Airlines of Venezuela, Novoa opened his first one-man show in Caracas, with great success, at the Galeria Oscar Ascanio in June of 1993. His exhibition "Art from Art" at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Santiago, Chile, met with great success. Using elements from other artists ranging from Michelangelo to Pablo Picasso, but re-interpreted through his cats, Novoa has eased his way into surrealism. Oil or acrylic on canvas.