“Néstor Basterrechea, one of the sculptors of the Basque group, together with Remigio Mendiburu and Ricardo Ugarte, is present with a large oak carving, a nocturnal genius – “ldittu”, a Basque deity. This piece develops, in the trunk, a musical modulation, like a song in two voices, alternating relief and concavity, the curved perfection of the cut. There is no representation. It is an abstraction that seems to humanise itself, a body that finds it hard to say its name, swaying in our senses, playing hide-and-seek with its truth.”
Westerdahl, E. (1973). La 1ª Exposición Internacional de Escultura en la calle, en Santa Cruz de Tenerife. Quaderns d’arquitectura i urbanisme, ISSN 1133-8857, Nº. 99. Número dedicado a los parques naturales, 47-50.
“Santa Cruz now has the elaborate and erect figure of Idittu, a totemic Basque divinity, carved in oak wood by Néstor Basterrechea (Bermeo, 1924), another essential name in recent Basque plastic art who, together with Oteiza, Chillida and Mendiburu, precisely, constituted the “Gaur Group” of the Basque School; due to the ligneous nature of its manufacture it has to be preserved under the roof of the Architects’ Association next to the Rambla.”
Hernández Perera, J. (1996). Dos décadas de Esculturas en la Calle. En A. Carnero, D. Duque, & C. Schwartz, Iª Exposición Internacional de Escultura en La Calle (págs. 25-54). Santa Cruz de Tenerife: Cabildo Insular de Tenerife. Área de Cultura. ISBN: 84-87340-63-6
“Experimental in the past, Néstor Basterrechea (b. 1924) offered us a piece, Idittu (1973), which represented his line of research into popular Basque cosmogony, another of whose proposals, more functional and spatialist, was shown by Remigio Mendiburu (b. 1931).”
Pérez Reyes, C. (1996). Reflexión sobre lo visto y lo vivido. En A. Carnero, D. Duque, & C. Schwartz, Iª Exposición Internacional de Escultura en La Calle (págs. 65-76). Santa Cruz de Tenerife: Cabildo Insular de Tenerife. Área de Cultura. ISBN: 84-87340-63-6
“Another procedure used to obtain works was to acquire them directly from the artist’s studio (…) Under the same assumption, Idittu (1973), a deity hollowed out of the trunk of an oak tree by Néstor Basterrechea, one of the most outstanding representatives of the Basque School, was also received from Vizcaya.”
Fernández Lomana, M.A. (1996). De la conmemoración al homenaje. En A. Carnero, D. Duque, & C. Schwartz, Iª Exposición Internacional de Escultura en La Calle (págs. 87-108). Santa Cruz de Tenerife: Cabildo Insular de Tenerife. Área de Cultura. ISBN: 84-87340-63-6