Mexican Painters, 1940

Mexican Painters: Rivera, Orozco, Siqueiros, Cantu and Other Artists of the Social Realist School
MacKinley Helm is an author.

American writer and collector. Among his books is Mexican school of painting
Definitive introduction to the art and artists of Mexico during great artistic movements of the 20s and 30s. In-depth discussion of major figures—Diego Rivera, Jose Clemente Orozco and David Alfaro Siqueiros — as well as 40 other artists: Guerrero Galvan, Federico Cantú, Guillermo Meza, Frida Kahlo , Maria Izquierdo , Chavez Morado more. Fascinating insights, political and social movements, historical context, etc. 95 illustrations.

MacKinley Helm (born 1896; died 1963) was an American writer and collector.
Among his friends during this period were Ines Amor, Alfred Barr, Henry Klifford, Federico Cantú, and William Spratling, which placed MacKinley Helm in a good position to write about these artists, and his book is now considered the best introduction to the art and artists of Mexico during the great artistic movements of the twenties and thirties.
Helm married Frances Lathrop Hammond (1894–1973)
Books
• 1936: After Pentecost: a history of Christian ideas and institutions from Peter and Paul to Ignatius of Antioch. New York: Harper
• 1941: Modern Mexican Painters. New York: Harper
• 1943: Story of Pipila
• 1942: Angel Mo' and her son, Roland Hayes. Boston: Little, Brown
• 1946: A Matter of Love, and other baroque tales of the provinces. New York: Harper
• 1948: John Marin. Boston: Pellegrini & Cudahy (reissued: New York: Kennedy; Da Capo Press, 1970)
• 1948: Journeying through Mexico. Boston: Little, Brown
• 1949: A Month of Sundays, and other baroque tales of the provinces. London: Harvill Press
• 1953: Spring in Spain. London: Gollancz
• 1953: Man of Fire; J. C. Orozco: an interpretative memoir. Boston: Institute of Contemporary Art
• 1956: Fray Junipero Serra: the great walker. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press (play)

MacKinley Helm , Frances Helm , Gloria Calero de Cantú , Federico Cantú
San Miguel Allende 1943

Modern Mexican Artists 1937

Frances Toor (1890–1956) was an American author, publisher, anthropologist and ethnographer who wrote mainly about Mexico and Mexican indigenous cultures She earned a B.A. and an M.A. in anthropology from University of California at Berkeley. She moved to Mexico City in 1922. In 1925, she founded the journal Mexican Folkways (published until 1937)

Carlos Mérida (December 2, 1891 – December 21, 1985) was a Guatemalan artist who was one of the first to fuse European modern painting to Latin American themes, especially those related to Guatemala and Mexico. He was part of the Mexican muralism movement in subject matter but less so in style, favoring a non-figurative and later geometric style rather than a figurative, narrative style. Mérida is best known for canvas and mural work, the latter including elements such as glass and ceramic mosaic on major constructions in the 1950s and 1960s. One of his major works, 4000m2 on the Benito Juarez housing complex,
Mérida’s art career began when he was still a teenager. His family’s move back to Guatemala City put him in touch with various artists and intellectuals. At age nineteen, he approached Catalan artist and writer Jaime Sabartés, who helped Mérida organize his first individual exhibition at the offices of the El Economista newspaper in Guatemala City in 1910
As there was little opportunity for artists in Guatemala, in 1910, Mérida traveled to Paris with a friend named Carlos Valenti on a German cargo ship.From then until 1914, he lived and worked in Paris and traveled much of Europe. This put him in touch with European avant garde artists such as Van Dagen, Amedeo Modigliani, Pablo Picasso and Piet Mondrian as well as Latin American artists studying in Europe such as Diego Rivera, Jorge Enciso, Ángel Zárraga and Dr. AtlHe exhibited his work in venues such as the Independent Salon and the Giroux Gallery in Paris.For unknown reasons, his traveling companion committed suicide in his studio, which affected Mérida deeply and temporarily losing interest in art. He was helped in overcoming this by Roberto Montenegro


Bo
CYDT Collection

10 things to know about Pierre-Auguste Renoir 

A guide to the artist who was one of the founding fathers of Impressionism, and is famed today for his lush depictions of female sensuality — featuring works offered at Christie’s
• Renoir’s early life was shaped by poverty
Pierre-Auguste Renoir was born in 1841 in Limoges in south-west France. His father was a tailor and his mother was a dressmaker, which is perhaps significant given that he would go on to become fascinated by fashion.
In his early life he was appreciated more for his singing than for his drawing. He took music lessons until his family encountered financial difficulties, which forced him to leave school and begin work as a painter in a porcelain factory.
As a young man Renoir moved to Paris, entered the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and later joined the studio of Charles Gleyre (1806-1874). Although he sometimes didn’t have enough money to buy paint, he lived close to the Louvre, where he enjoyed studying the works of the Old Masters.

• He was one of the main founders of Impressionism
In 1869 Renoir began sketching beside the water at La Grenouillère, outside Paris, with Claude Monet. This was a seminal moment in the history of art as the two men simultaneously developed several of the theories, techniques and practices that would give rise to Impressionism, including using loose brushstrokes to capture the effects of light and movement on the trees and water at various times of day.
Renoir’s sun-dappled Sentier dans le bois, painted in 1874, is quintessentially Impressionist, focussing on the artist’s fleeting sensations before nature. The vibrating tissue of broken brushstrokes, a revolutionary departure from Salon norms, evokes the flickering play of sunlight as well as the gentle rustling of the breeze.
In L’ombrelle, painted in 1878, Renoir depicts the quintessential Impressionist subject of the fashionably attired Parisienne within a scene of abundantly flowering nature. The painting exemplifies the artist’s ideal of harmoniously integrating a figure into an outdoor setting, and of capturing the effects of light and shade in a range of dazzling colours.
• Renoir’s Impressionist work was rejected by the Salon
• On occasion during the 1860s, Renoir submitted paintings that were accepted into the famous Salon exhibitions, as did Monet. But as their painterly experiments gathered pace in the 1870s, both artists found their works were repeatedly rejected.
• Eventually, they ceased submitting pictures for consideration and when Monet started his own independent artists’ society, which became known as the Impressionists, Renoir was one of the first to join. He displayed six paintings in the First Impressionist Exhibition in April 1874.
• Renoir painted figures in fashionable dress, positioning his models in modern settings: crowded boulevards, cafés, theatres, sun-dappled parks, and elegantly appointed domestic interiors. Even when the setting is little more than a curtain of greenery, the play of light across figure and ground alike suggests a specific, fleeting moment.

Some of his most famous works from this period include Dance at the Moulin de la Galette (Musée d’Orsay, Paris) and La Loge (Courtauld Gallery, London).
• eanne Samary (above) was one of the most celebrated actresses in Paris when she first sat for Renoir in 1877. Between 1877 and 1880, Renoir depicted Samary in no fewer than eight oils and four pastels, more than any other single sitter.
• Renoir mixed with the Parisian elite, from writers to restaurateurs to bankers
Renoir’s ability to capture the crowd garnered the attention of the Parisian elite. Soon his list of patrons included such notable figures as patissier, restaurateur and collector Eugène Murer, and Madame Georges Charpentier, whose salons were attended by the likes of Flaubert, Zola and Manet.
In 1878, at Charpentier’s home, Renoir met banker Paul Bérard. Renoir regularly visited Bérard’s country house in Wargemont where he experimented with seascapes and still lifes, as well as painting portraits of Bérard’s children.
• His 1881-1882 trip abroad was a watershed moment
During the 1870s Renoir had painted several ambitious Orientalist scenes, including a somewhat risqué transposition of Delacroix’s masterpiece, Les femmes d’Alger. In 1881 he followed in the footsteps of Delacroix by travelling to Algeria, becoming the only one of the Impressionists ever to experience the region first-hand.

From Algeria he travelled to Madrid to study the paintings of Velázquez, before heading to Italy where he realised a long-held ambition by viewing masterpieces by Raphael, Titian and and other Renaissance masters. He also studied the ancient frescoes of Pompeii, and travelled to Sicily, where he visited Richard Wagner, and painted the composer’s portrait in just 35 minutes. It was on this trip that he began to seek what he recalled as ‘broad harmonies without any longer preoccupying myself with the small details which dim the sunlight’.
Renoir returned to France a changed man, adopting a linear classical style influenced by the work of Ingres and Boucher, working more in a studio than in the open air, and increasingly focusing on mythology and the female form.
• Renoir turned away from Impressionism, but the critical reaction was lukewarm
‘I had wrung Impressionism dry,’ Renoir told Ambroise Vollard late in his life. ‘I finally came to the conclusion that I knew neither how to paint nor draw.’ This realisation sparked a three-year period of intense questioning and experimentation, during which Renoir reintroduced traditional notions of draughtsmanship into his art.
He abandoned scenes of modern life, accepted only a very few portrait commissions, and left many smaller figure studies unfinished. Although he continued to produce landscapes and still-lifes, his attention was focused on a series of major figure paintings, in which he consolidated his new, linear style
By the opening weeks of 1887, the artist had put the finishing touches on Les grandes baigneuses, the culmination of his series of sculptural nudes in impressionistically rendered landscapes. He had high hopes for the monumental painting, which he had worked on for three years, and told Bérard that his goal was to ‘beat Raphael’. When the painting was exhibited in May at the Galerie Georges Petit, however, critical response was mixed.
• Renoir had three sons, including the film-maker Jean Renoir
By early 1888, Renoir had changed direction yet again, pronouncing to his dealer, Paul Durand-Ruel, that ‘I have taken up again, never to abandon it, my old style, soft and light of touch.’ From the 1890s, there was a fresh emphasis on colour and sensuality in his paintings of female bathers, domestic scenes and the carefree, idyllic lives of pretty bourgeois girls.

In 1890, Renoir married Aline Victorine Charigot, a model for one of the figures in Luncheon of the Boating Party (1880-81). She was 20 years his junior and bore him three sons — Pierre (1885-1952), who became an actor; Jean (1894-1979), who would become one of France’s greatest film-makers; and Claude (1901-1969), who also worked in the film industry before becoming a ceramic artist. Jean and Claude were used by their father as models from a young age, with the younger boy sitting for 90 works.

• Gabrielle Renard, nanny to Renoir’s youngest child, became his muse and studio assistant
Gabrielle Renard, a distant cousin of Renoir’s wife, joined the household in 1894 as governess to the couple’s infant son, Jean. She quickly became an indispensable member of the family, as well as the artist’s favourite model.

Over two decades Renoir depicted Renard reading, sewing, or caring for children, as a washerwoman in the French countryside, and as a goddess in The Judgment of Paris. She was frequently portrayed as an object of erotic desire. Latterly, as Renoir worked in the studio, Renard acted as his assistant.

Between 1907 and 1911, Renoir painted several canvases of Renard loosely clad in a semi-transparent white chemise that falls open to reveal her ample form. Gabrielle au miroir (above), painted circa 1910, once hung in the living room of Peggy and David Rockefeller’s New York home.

• Henri Matisse visited Renoir often
From 1907 Renoir, who was suffering from rheumatoid athritis, spent his winters in Cagnes-sur-Mer on the French Riviera, and his summers in a village in the Champagne region. He first met Henri Matisse in late 1917, and the younger man became a frequent visitor to Cagnes until Renoir’s death two years later.
Matisse described Les baigneuses, painted 1918-19 (Musée d’Orsay, Paris), as ‘the loveliest nudes ever painted’, and was greatly influenced by Renoir’s studio masquerades, which in turn drew from Delacroix and Orientalism. When Matisse began his own series of odalisques in 1919, he followed Renoir’s example by posing his favourite models in the intimate surroundings of his studio, with no pretence at a plausible ethnography of costume or setting.

• Renoir lived to see his work hang in the Louvre
Over the course of his life Renoir painted several thousand paintings. Although he quickly found commercial success, he seemed to be driven primarily by his enjoyment of the act of painting. He once remarked to his teacher, Gleyre, ‘If painting were not a pleasure to me I should certainly not do it’. 

Shortly before he died in 1919 he visited the Louvre, where his work was now hung alongside the Old Masters he had long admired.

Federico Cantú 1907-1989

Un dia como hoy :
Pero en Mayo 2 de 1861
El C. Benito Juárez, Presidente interino
Decreta el establecimiento de una 
“Lotería Nacional “

Calendario de 1967 ilustrado por Federico Cantú , con el tema de la Tira de la Peregrinación Azteca

Imágenes del los pendones de la Diosa de la Fortuna , para la entrada del edificio de la Lotería Nacional por Federico Cantú.

Tres variaciones en grafica con el tema de la Diosa de la Fortuna por Federico Cantú.

Zodío o Zodiacal, palabra de origen griego ζωδιακός [κύκλος]:son signos que provienen de «zoodiakos [kiklos], ciclo zodiacal». De acuerdo con la astrología, los fenómenos celestes reflejan o rigen las actividades humanas, de forma que se sostiene que los doce signos del Zodíaco representan doce personalidades básicas o modelos de expresión característicos. Son 12 los signos tradicionales: Aries, Tauro, Géminis, Cáncer, Leo, Virgo, Libra, Escorpio, Sagitario, Capricornio, Acuario y Piscis.

Si bien dice el culto zodiacal tiene sus inicios muy antiguos en Babilonia y Egipto, todas las fuentes consultadas, especialmente los astrólogos, que estudian éstos, dicen que el zodiacal occidental tal como lo conocemos proviene de la antigua Grecia: los 12 dioses olímpicos de la mitología griega,​​​​ donde son protectores de su propio signo, sus personalidades son muy distintas, y tienen virtudes como defectos en particular. Aunque hay una versión que explica que los signos zodiacales fueron creados por Ram (Rama) con los que narra su vida, batallas y conquistas.

Los signos están influenciados por un planeta o astro y estos llevan nombres de la mitología romana antigua, que tienen el mismo equivalente en la mitología griega (ejemplo, Venus: Afrodita; el Sol: Helios). El culto dejó de practicarse tras la prohibición de la inquisición cristiana (s. IV d. C.), y fue retomado varios siglos después a partir del Renacimiento (s. XVI-XVII), o más tarde incluso.

Tanto en la astrología occidental como en la India se enfatiza el espacio y el movimiento del Sol, la Luna y los planetas en el cielo a través de cada uno de los signos zodiacales. En la astrología china, en cambio, el énfasis se encuentra en el tiempo, con el zodiaco operando en ciclos de años, meses y horas del día. Una característica común de las tres tradiciones, no obstante, es la importancia del signo ascendente, es decir, el signo zodiacal que está ascendiendo, según la rotación de la Tierra, en el horizonte oriental en el momento del nacimiento de la persona.

Descendimiento de la cruz  -   José de Arimatea

Sudario, de la palabra latina sudarium, significa en su origen un lienzo o pañuelo que sirve para cubrirle el rostro a las personas muertas y demostrarles sus respetos.
Se dice en el Evangelio, Marc, c. 14, v. 51, que un joven que seguía a Jesucristo cuando fue preso en el huerto de los olivos, no tenía más que una sábana para cubrir su desnudez, que los soldados quisieron detenerlo, que dejó su sábana y se fugó, Sansón prometió treinta sábanas, (en hebreo, sindinim) y otras tantas túnicas a los jóvenes que asistían a sus bodas si podían explicar el enigma que les propuso. , se dice que la mujer fuerte hacía sábanas y ceñidores y los vende a los cananeos o fenicios

Leemos en el Evangelio que José de Arimatea para sepultar a Jesucristo compró una sábana, sindonim y en ella envolvió el cuerpo de Jesús.

José de Arimatea es un personaje bíblico que, de acuerdo al Evangelio de Mateo 27:60, era el propietario del sepulcro en el cual fue depositado el cuerpo de Jesús de Nazaret después de su crucifixión y muerte. 

Un «hombre rico» según San Mateo; un hombre «ilustre» según San Marcos; «persona buena y honrada» según San Lucas; «...que era discípulo de Jesús» según San Mateo, «pero clandestino por miedo a las autoridades judías», según San Juan. Marcos comienza señalando que José compartiendo la visión de la venida del Reino de Dios (lo cual Lucas 23:51 repite) entró "osadamente" a pedirle el cuerpo de Jesús a Pilato (15:43). Lucas añade que este varón "no había consentido en el acuerdo ni en los hechos" de los líderes religiosos.

Lo cierto es que los cuatro evangelistas coinciden en contar el mismo episodio donde intervino San José de Arimatea. Jesús acaba de morir en la cruz, Pedro renegó de Él por tres veces en público, los apóstoles se dispersan, pero este hombre solicita al procurador romano Poncio Pilato que le permita dar sepultura al cuerpo de Jesús. Con la ayuda de Nicodemo, desclava el cuerpo de la cruz y lo sepulta en su propia tumba, un sepulcro nuevo, recién excavado en la roca, donde se encuentra la basílica del Santo Sepulcro. Lo envolvieron en lienzos de lino y lo colocaron en la tumba con una gran piedra en la entrada. Por esto, la tradición católica lo tiene como patrono de embalsamadores y sepultureros.

José de Arimatea es protagonista de la apócrifa Declaración de José de Arimatea, escrita en primera persona, en la que se reivindica como responsable del descendimiento y entierro de Cristo y narra el cautiverio al que el Sanedrín la condena por ello. Estas represalias son también referidas en el Evangelio de Nicodemo.

CYDT Collection 

A Letter from EXPO CHICAGO President | Director Tony Karman

Dear Adolfo,

On behalf of all of us at EXPO CHICAGO, I offer our heartfelt sympathy and compassion for everyone touched by this pandemic, as well as our deepest gratitude to those on the front line of care. Even in these most challenging times, I hold on to a profound sense of optimism, despite the new reality we all are sharing and its impact on our lives and livelihoods, I also maintain the sincere belief that together we will overcome the many challenges we are facing and do so in new and innovative ways.

As we prepare for the upcoming ninth edition of EXPO CHICAGO slated for September 24–27, 2020, safety for all who will be participating remains our utmost priority. We are moving forward as scheduled and continually monitoring recommendations from health professionals and government agencies. However, if after several months it is determined that large events still should not take place, we will set new dates. As we navigate in these uncertain times, we are extremely grateful for the leadership and sound advice of our Selection Committee, who we will continue to draw upon for guidance, as well as thoughtful council provided by countless professionals and civic leaders in Chicago and across the globe.

Now and in the future, I want to restate our pledge to remain at all times an attentive, nimble, and resilient collaborator and to utilize the many communications and marketing channels to amplify and support the local and international gallery community and the work of our many partners. Most importantly, we ask that you let us know how we can be more helpful to you. We are committed to being an active force in the recovery of the art world for a broad group of constituents—both commercial and institutional—as we prepare to be one of the first leading international art fairs in the Americas to be held following the current restrictions. 

To that end, I feel it is important to offer my perspectives and to share our plans with each of our core constituents who have helped shape our success and who we hope to continue to serve.

Commitment to Our Exhibitors – Partners:

We are all aware of just how much of the commercial sector of the artworld is built upon galleries who are taking the risks represented by their investments in their spaces, programs, exhibitions, and their staffs, while also covering the expenses of shipping, insurance, storage, and art fairs in service to their artists and patrons. EXPO CHICAGO has always followed an exhibitor-first approach in everything we do, recognizing that we would not be here if it was not for their confidence in collaborating with us. EXPO CHICAGO always strives to adjust to the needs of the community and reinforces that commitment in the truest sense of the word – partnership. 

Recognizing the many pressing challenges our gallery partners are facing, for the upcoming 2020 edition we are reducing the impact of our invoicing, adjusting payment schedules, providing incentives to reduce booth fees and committing to work individually with our exhibitors to accommodate to their needs. The current state of affairs demands this action and we look forward to working closely with dealers throughout the world over the next few weeks and months as we further shape our ninth edition.

Additionally, in support of the community of dealers, we will also be making contributions to both the Art Dealers Association of America (ADAA) and the New Art Dealers Association (NADA) from the proceeds of this year’s exposition to help advance the important work these organizations are doing on behalf of their member galleries.

Commitment to Our Visitors & Patrons

From our inception, our tagline has been “September in Chicago. Be here.” With deep respect to you, the industry, and in the spirit of collaboration and renewal, we recommit to this pledge as we prepare to present what we hope will be impactful convening event in the heart of America this Fall. We do so with the health and safety our visitors, patrons and participating galleries, foremost in our minds and in our preparations. We will keep you informed on our efforts to incorporate best practices into the exposition and rest assure that we will establish protections that I believe strongly will be the new normal for the future of events. 

Our Company & Mission:

EXPO CHICAGO is a privately-owned company that I lead, and which was formed with the support a small group of investors, primarily drawn from Chicago’s civic leadership who believe in the cultural, social, and economic benefits of Chicago hosting a major international art exposition. The first edition of the exposition was launched in 2012. We do not have the advantages of being part of a publicly traded convention and trade show company, and because of that, we share the sensibilities and sensitivities of being a small business — like most of the galleries with whom we partner. We are keenly aware of what EXPO CHICAGO shares with art dealers, which is a unique understanding of inherent risk and hard work that produces reward. 

From the outset, we built our company with an unwavering commitment of service to our exhibitors while presenting an international art fair that respects and supports the investment that each dealer has made. We set out to produce an exposition that would reestablish a vital marketplace in the center of the US and to renew the grand tradition of Chicago hosting a leading international art exposition each year that serves the region, the United States, and the global arts community. We have, and fervently maintain, our commitment to the highest level of production — focusing on quality, not quantity of exhibitors, to innovate and present critically acclaimed programming such as our Curatorial Initiatives and other platforms, advance a new online platform for our printed journal THE SEEN, and invest in advertising and outreach to ensure our exhibitors’ success. 

Chicago’s Collaborative Community: 

Our success is due in large part to the unwavering support of Chicago’s cultural, business, and hospitality community – including our civic leaders, museums, institutions, universities, galleries, artists, and arts professionals. Ingrained in our great city is a profound ethos of collaboration, and it is this strong community of cooperation that remains a most powerful foundation for us to both rely and build upon. Chicago is filled with renowned museums and arts organizations, respected arts professionals and curators, world class teaching institutions, a vibrant network of working artists, an abundance of great hotels, a celebrated restaurant scene and night-life, diverse neighborhoods and small businesses, great architecture, the lakefront and so much more. All involved stands together ready to welcome the world with us. We benefit greatly from our beloved landmark venue – Navy Pier – and we plan to capitalize on Chicago’s strategic position in the center of America to draw patrons from both the coasts, the Greater Midwest region, and beyond. 

With eyes wide open, we recognize that there are many challenges ahead in these rapidly changing times. On behalf of the entire team at EXPO CHICAGO, thank you for your continued support and confidence, and we genuinely hope to hear from you to answer any questions and listen to any suggestions that you may have. 

In closing, I reaffirm my sincerest hope for the health and safety of our families and friends, while yearning for the time that we will once again be able to experience the work of artists in person. With humility, I offer our global arts community heartfelt wishes for the fortitude to prevail, the clarity and wisdom to innovate and build on existing partnerships and, although it may sound lofty, the collective determination of us all to utilize the many avenues we have at our disposal for the greater good of our artists, our local communities, and most importantly the wellbeing of our world. 

With respect and gratitude,

Tony Karman
President | Director
EXPO CHICAGO
For a listing of local and national resources available to galleries, artists, curators, and cultural workers, visit our website.

EXPO CHICAGO Adjusts Payment Schedules for Exhibitors in Lead-Up to September Fair
Written by Sarah Douglas

Los Poetas Laureados :

Cardoza y Aragónhace mención de la visita de Alfonso Reyes a Montparnasse, después de la liberación de Paris (1945) .  Narra como Alfonso llego al barrio, en busca de viejos amigos y se rencontrócon Kiki de Montparnasse:  Dice Cardoza ; Y los dos se engañaron argumentando que seguían viéndose igual después de tantos años.

En 1945 Alfonso Reyes obtuvo el premio nacional de Ciencias y Artes en literatura, Premio que también que en 1971 se extiende a Federico Cantú y mismo que rechaza .

En 1958 recibe el doctorado honoris causa por la Universidad de la Sorbona y el de Berkeley California, Las minifaldas que ve en un establecimiento de comida rápida en California le encantan: "Aquílas chicas sirven comida usando patines y con los muslos al aire, como en la Creta minoica", escribe en su diario. 

En 1950 Federico Cantuinicia una serie de obras murales en torno a los dos ideales que compartía con Alfonso Reyes. Uno seria el culto a la mitología nacional, recreando hazañas murales con obras como , Las Enseñanzas de Quetzalcóatl. Caída de Tenochtitlan , Tira de la Peregrinación Azteca, y con la misma maestría creo la guardesa de la mitología griega con obra como Caída de Troya, Ceres , Metamorfosis de Daphne , Ceres Xilonen Chicomecóatl.

A la muerte de Alfonso Reyes en 1959 . Cantu decide crear un proyecto en torno a la memoria de Reyes y para ello inicia una serie de bocetos con el tema del Poeta Laureado , 

Y sin mas recuerda el pasaje de Apolo y Daphne :Hay varias versiones del mito en el que aparece, pero la narración general que aparece en la mitología grecorromana, es que debido a una maldición hecha por el dios Cupido, hijo de Venus, sobre el dios Apolo (Febo), se convirtió en la objeto involuntario de la obsesión de Apolo, que la persiguió en contra de sus deseos. Justo antes de ser besado por él, Daphne le pidió ayuda a su padre, el dios del río, quien la transformó en un árbol de laurel, frustrando así a Apolo.

A partir de entonces, Apolo desarrolló una reverencia especial por el laurel. En los Juegos de Pythian que se celebraron cada cuatro años en Delphi en honor a Apolo, se otorgó una corona de laurel del Valle de Tempe en Tesalia como premio. Por lo tanto, más tarde se convirtió en costumbre otorgar premios en forma de coronas de laurel a los victoriosos generales, atletas, poetas y músicos, que se usaban como una corona en la cabeza. El poeta laureado es un ejemplo moderno bien conocido de tal ganador de premios, que data del Renacimiento temprano en Italia.

Ya en el tema grecolatino Federico decide incorporar junto con el tondo de poeta laureado la idea de Palas Atenea , misma que quedara plasmada en la escultura monumental de la capilla Alfonsina acompañada del tondo donde Alfonso aparece como Poeta Laureado  

y que concluirámuchos años después con la obra escultórica Palas Atenea,

Que flaquea hoy la capilla Alfonsina en la UANL.

 Si bien Alfonso Reyes pudo degustar la ultima etapa de la obra de caballete y mural de Federico Cantu .

Sin duda Capto todo lo que venia por hacer en décadas futuras adivinado obras como

Quetzalcóatl y los Tlacuilos , Tláloc devora a Xilonen , Toltecas y escribas , la peregrinación en el Códice Ramírez  Las Enseñanzas del Cura hidalgo , Madona IMSS, todo este gran acerbo mural de IMSS seguido por la obra monumental de los misioneros de Guadalupe con su viacrucis y crucifixión asícomo el relieve monumental con el tema de Seres- Xilonen en los Altares Nuevo león , y por supuesto la monumentalidad de la UANL , con Nezahualcóyotl y el agua , Palas Atenea , Xochipilli, Los Informantes de Sahagún , Sócrates , Fedon , Diótima  de Mantinea, Minerva.

Recordando todo este legado de Federico Cantu con un pensamiento de Alfonso Reyes.

La obra de Federico aviva el afán prehispánico, la flora, la fauna, el paisaje y la simbología mitológica  religiosa. Pero sobre todo recrea el universo cultural que cultivo a lo largo de su vida.

Federico Cantu en  murió1989, treinta años después que Alfonso Reyes , sin embargo el pensamiento , espíritu y obra,  lo podemos estudiar, recordar y admirar dentro del legado de la UANL.

Al final los dos maestros después de su gran travesía regresaron a su patria , regresaron a Nuevo León. Asícomo Ulises a Ítaca.

Adolfo Cantu

Colección de Arte Cantú Y de Teresa

Art Consultant & Specialist

Fideicomiso Casa Estudio Federico & Elsa©

CYDT© BoArt©

Federico Cantú

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Doro Carpeta Dorian

Como elementos dispersos dentro de la vida y obra de Federico Cantú, vamos  descubriendo una ruta muy interesante, donde diferentes personajes van enriqueciendo su ya rica biografía  , el turno es ahora para el Poeta  Edward Doro, que  de alguna manera coincidiera en California con Federico y que posteriomente se rencontrarían en  Paris y Nueva York .

Gracias a la sorpresiva aparición de la “Carpeta Dorian” en la casa de subastas  Chez - Rouillac, en Paris y consecuentemente la digitalización de la obra , podemos saber que Doro, es el autor de uno de los primeros textos iconográfico de la obra de Federico ,  dicho texto se refiere a la obra “Madona” que pintara Federico en la navidad de 1928 en California .

Para fortuna de muchos visitantes, tenemos temporalmente la obra Madona, expuesta en el Museo MUNE en Monterrey , donde la pueden admirar!

Adolfo Cantú

CYDT Collection 

Otros dos datos que son interesantes respecto a Doro , es su buen gusto por la obra grafica!  Ejemplo de ello es el libro publicado en NY The Boar & Shibboleth 

By Edward Doro – Wood engravings by Paul Landacre  y que sin duda nos trasportan a la obra de Utamaro 1753- 1806, no cave duda que el arte lleva una ruta universal .