Mexican Painter Alberto Gironella Dead at 70
Dateline: 08/09/99
The art and literacy worlds are today mourning the passing of Mexican surrealist, Alberto Gironella, as news of his death at his home in Valle de Bravo, Mexico, last Monday have surfaced. His passing is being reported around the world including in this CBC report.
Mr. Gironella painted surreal versions of subjects that included Emiliano Zapata, the Mexican revolutionary leader, and the pop singer, Madonna, as well as interpretations of paintings by Veláquez and Goya.
In the late '40s and early '50s he helped found two short-lived literary magazines, Clavileno and Segret and wrote poetry and an unpublished novel. Frustrated with his stalled literary career, he turned to painting. In 1984, he did, however, donate several of his paintings to help finance the leftist newspaper La Jornado, which was founded in opposition to the government' s restrictions on the news media which were enacted that year. The newspaper is now one of the nation's daily newspapers.
In 1960, he received the Bienal de Pintura Joven in Paris -- an award to young painters. His work was regularly exhibited in Paris, Mexico City, Madrid, New York, and Belgrade. In 1997, he was included in The New Worlds exhibition at the Art Museum of the Americas in Washington DC. The exhibition displayed the work of artists from twenty-one different countries including Mexico, Central and South America, and Cuba.
He was part of a young group of Mexican artists who broke away from the influence of more established artists, particularly muralists, such as Diego Rivera and David Alfaro Siqueiros. These older artists used their art to depict the poverty and suffering of the Mexican people but the younger group wanted to have the freedom to create works of fantasy and innovation, rather than be burdened with a "social conscience" or, their words, have their art used as political propaganda by the Communists. This group included Gironella, Lilia Carrili Cevas, Echeverria, Felguérez, Garcia Ponce, Rojo, and Vlady.
This dissension lead to the establishment of new, non-official galleries that would exhibit the work of these rebel artists -- the Proteo Gallery, the Gallery Antonio Souza, and the Gallery Juan Martin, being the most notable examples. These galleries supported the young artists and allowed the next generation of Mexican artists to gain their international reputations.
