Miguel Conde

Miguel Condé (b. 1939) is a Mexican-born French printmaker and painter whose work blends Renaissance draftsmanship with the dark whimsy of surrealism. Though often categorized as a figurative artist, Condé’s world is anything but straightforward. His etchings, drawings, and paintings teem with grotesque figures, masked beings, court jesters, and ambiguous creatures—at once comic, tragic, and theatrical.

Born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to a Mexican father (the painter Salvador Condé) and an American mother, Miguel Condé grew up between cultures. After studying art in the United States and Mexico, he moved to Paris in the 1960s, where he encountered the rigorous traditions of European printmaking. It was in France, under the mentorship of master printer Stanley William Hayter at Atelier 17, that Condé honed his skills and developed his distinctive visual language.

Condé’s etchings are lush with detail—sometimes baroque, always finely controlled. His characters appear in ambiguous, dreamlike settings that suggest narratives without fully revealing them. Their expressive gestures and exaggerated anatomies nod to Goya, Daumier, and Bosch, while his technique reflects a deep respect for the Old Masters. Yet Condé’s work is unmistakably contemporary: ironic, psychologically rich, and deeply personal.

Throughout his career, Condé has received international acclaim. He has exhibited extensively in Europe and the Americas, and his works are held in major institutions such as the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the Art Institute of Chicago.

More than a printmaker, Miguel Condé is a storyteller in line and tone. His fantastical imagery draws us into a shadowy theater of the absurd, where history, humor, and the grotesque converge—and where, beneath the surface, very human truths are laid bare.

His work is represented in numerous museums and collections:

The Museum of Modern Art in New York
The Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC
The Art Institute of Chicago
University of Essex Collection of Latin American Art,
Reina Sofia Museum, Madrid, Spain
Albertina in Vienna, Austria
Bibliothèque nationale de France in Paris
Brooklyn Museum of art in New York
Cleveland Museum of Art
Blanton Museum of Art in Austin
Museo de Arte Contemporáneo, Madrid, Spain