Gradowczyk describes Xul at this point in his life as “a visionary rabidly opposed to the canons reigning in the Buenos Aires of his time". Like other artistically-inclined people of his generation, Xul sought to study in Europe, and settled for a time in Paris while it was an epicenter for avant-garde art. The city was home to the Cubists, while attracting Italian futurists, Russian artists, and participating in the dialogue about German Expressionism. There was also a fashion for sculpture and objects brought back to Europe by anthropologists and traders from African and Pacific Ocean colonies, as well as the Americas.