Born in Montevideo in 1949, the son of a Basque immigrant, he takes courses on advertisement drawing and soon starts painting, earning different awards in his country. In 1977 he marries and travels to Spain. He settles in Cadaqués, a Mediterranean city near Barcelona, where he works with Ramón Aguilar Moré. In his own words, he wishes to “ease his expressionism, clear his palette, transform linear drawing into painting…”

In 1984 he returns to Uruguay and carries out exhibitions in Punta del Este and later in Buenos Aires, and in the two following years in different Latin American cities.

In 1988 he is one of 15 artists chosen by the Fund for Artists Colonies of New York to participate in a colony of artists, spending three months in the US a year later, coexisting with artists from different countries.

In 1994 he wins the Grand Prix of the 4th International Painting Biennial in Cuenca, Ecuador. In 1995 he is granted the Casa di Risparmio Prize in the Venice Biennial. In 2002, motivated by his experience with the Artists’ Colony, Iturria decides to open an art school named “Casablanca, art in action.” With the important cooperation of Néstor Piñón, his brother-in-law who directs the school, and his son Nacho in the area of music, this adventure begins and it still goes on today. The idea is to relate different artistic disciplines: painting, music, dance, theater, literature, photography, audiovisual…

In 2004 he is invited to Guatemala to be a juror at the 14th Paiz Art Biennial in that country. He later stays working in the jungle of El Salvador, where he organizes a small artistic community, the “Coatepeque” group.

In April 2006 he settles again in Cadaqués, Spain. He spends three years there painting in a huge atelier, being permanently visited by a host of students and friends who stay with him painting for a while.

In 2011 the Ignacio Iturria Foundation is created with the central purpose of promoting the vocational development of artists, thus realizing the dream of an Artists Colony in Rosario, department of Colonia, in Uruguay.