Cubism, with Pablo Picasso, Juan Gris and André Lhote among its main protagonists, brought about a radical transformation of pictorial language. Lhote, considered one of the great theoreticians of this movement, shows how the abstract and the figurative intertwine in calm volumetric planes. We should also mention Albert Gleizes, who moved to Barcelona in 1916 and held his first solo exhibition at the Dalmau gallery; his works from this period deconstructed objects in geometric perspectives, without losing reference to the real world.

At almost the same time, artists such as Alexander Archipenko and Kurt Schwitters were concentrating on the more constructive spirit of painting, visible in Collage No. 2 (1913) and Miniature sans titre (1920), the latter in a Dadaist spirit, directly linked to the teachings of Francis Picabia and Serge Charcoune. Schwitters even incorporated waste into his production with his Merz concept: any material can become a work of art.

The presence of Spanish artists in Paris gave rise to the development of Surrealism, with figures such as Salvador Dalí, Joan Miró, Luis Fernández and Óscar Domínguez, the creator of decalcomania, a technique linked to Breton's Surrealist circle.