Alfonso Costa was born in Noia (A Coruña) in 1943. Since he was a child his imagination and drawing ability were obvious, so his mother registered him in a correspondence course in AFHA. In 1960, when he was 17, he moved to Barcelona where he worked very hard during his art education. He studied in Llotja Escuela de Artes y Oficios a three-year-long course in six months and at the same time he worked doing printing works and as a sign writer. He took part in different art competitions and received several awards, so gradually he became a well-known artist.
In the late sixties, he had an exhibition in Sala Arte Moderna, where he met Carlos Aguilera, director of the famous Trece Gallery. He asked Alfonso to work exclusively for him. In 1972 Fundación March awarded a grant to Alfonso to travel to Florence. This trip to Italy was his first contact with Europe. When he came back from Italy he was already a recognized artist, he had several exhibitions, he received different prizes and he took part in different international art fairs. In this period he started successfully engraving and mural painting (Instituto Frenopático, Cárcel de Jóvenes).
In the eighties his artistic activity was strong: he took part in exhibitions, art fairs and art competitions. He designed posters, painted murals and received awards that recognized his work. At the same time, his international career was consolidated, in France and Germany. In 1984 he became Noia’s favorite son. In 1997 he settled down definitively in Galicia, were he kept working tirelessly and he developed his educative facet: he gave Engraving Courses in Liceo de Noia.
His working capacity and imagination seem endless, as all the activities that he did since 2000 affirm: collaboration with different publications, design of posters and trophies, several exhibitions in Galicia and outside. He painted numerous murals, such as Liceo de Noia’s cupola. He made outside sculptures, publications about his life and worked were edited, he received different prizes and mentions. Retrospective exhibitions took place in 2005 in Universidade de Santiago de Compostela and in 2009 in Caixa Nova, Vigo. This is an intense career which the artist says humbly: “Every day I am born to art”.
