Biography

Nemesio Antúnez Zañartu was an influential Chilean painter and engraver who founded Workshop 99. Born to Nemesio Antúnez and Luisa Zañartu, he was the eldest of three sons, all of whom became dedicated to art: Enrique Zañartu (6 September 1921 - 13 June 2000) became a painter and Jaime Antúnez (6 March 1923 - 10 May 2010) a sculptor. The couple also had a daughter named Laura (2 September 1919 - 30 July 2010). He went to High School at the College of the Sacred Hearts of Santiago. At 17, he took first place at a French speaking competition and won a trip to France, where he learned about Pablo Picasso, Juan Gris and Joan Miro. In 1938 he enrolled in the school of architecture at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile, where he graduated in 1941. At the age of 25 he presented his first solo watercolor exhibition at the Chilean Institute of Culture. Thanks to a scholarship from the Fulbright Program, he traveled to Columbia University in New York. Upon completing his Master's degree in 1947, he began working in the studio Atelier 17 with Stanley William Hayter, who applied the techniques of printmaking to surrealist art. He worked with his brother Enrique to explore the possibilities of old printmaking techniques from artists like Yves Tanguy, Kurt Seligmann, Jacques Lipchitz and Joan Miro. In 1950, the French branch of Atelier 17 was moved.