Mexico's Bellas Artes says goodbye to provocative artist Cuevas, dead at 83

Record ID: 897996

  • Title: Mexico's Bellas Artes says goodbye to provocative artist Cuevas, dead at 83
  • Date: 5th July 2017
  • Summary: MEXICO CITY, MEXICO (JULY 4, 2017) (REUTERS) ***WARNING CONTAINS FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY*** MAN CARRYING FLORAL ARRANGEMENT WALKING TOWARDS THE BELLAS ARTES PALACE HEARSE CARRYING THE REMAINS OF JOSE LUIS CUEVAS, ARRIVING TO THE PALACE PALLBEARER CARRYING REMAINS OF JOSE LUIS CUEVAS IN URN, AUDIENCE CLAPPING CUEVAS' WIFE, BEATRIZ DEL CARMEN BAZAN (CENTRE), AT MEMORIAL VARIOUS OF URN WITH CUEVAS' ASHES RELATIVES CRYING WIDE OF MEMORIAL (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) CULTURE SECRETARY, MARIA CRISTINA GARCIA CEPEDA, SAYING: "Irreverent, profoundly original, generous and visionary. Jose Luis Cuevas is synonymous with creative liberty, discovery, vanguard, and always a model and occurrence of genius and discovery." URN WITH CUEVAS' ASHES WITH PEOPLE PAYING RESPECTS ON BOTH SIDES AUDIENCE LISTENING TO SPEECHES (SOUNDBITE) (Spanish) CUEVAS' FRIEND AND ARTISTA, FERNANDO GONZALEZ CORTAZAR, SAYING: "Today my condolences to Mexico and the world, to culture and art, and I leave proof of my profound love, my admiration, and my endless thanks for this man, who to paraphrase Octavio Paz, every day painted our wound." URN FLANKED BY MOURNERS AUDIENCE OBSERVING AND CLAPPING RELATIVES AND FRIENDS CHEERING CUEVAS AND CLAPPING WIDE OF MEMORIAL
  • Embargoed: 19th July 2017 01:36
  • Keywords: Memorial held for Mexican artist Jose Luis Cuevas funeral urn family and friends memorial remembrance
  • Location: MEXICO CITY, MEXICO
  • City: MEXICO CITY, MEXICO
  • Country: Mexico
  • Reuters ID: LVA0016OB011F
  • Aspect Ratio: 16:9
  • Story Text:Family and friends of controversial Mexican artist Jose Luis Cuevas paid their respects to the man described by Mexico's culture secretary as "profoundly original" at the Bellas Artes Palace in Mexico City on Tuesday (July 4).
    Cuevas, who set out to shock a national art scene dominated by mural painters and once even put his own semen into an exhibition, died at the age of 83 on Monday (July 03), the government said in a statement. The cause was not immediately clear.
    Cuevas' brooding figures graced exhibits from Paris to New York during a career as a painter, sculptor, writer, draftsman and engraver that spanned more than seven decades.
    Cultivating the image of a philandering "tomcat", Cuevas drew on the work of Francisco de Goya and Pablo Picasso, and his depictions of dark, deformed, animal-like figures were a sharp break with the socialist-tinged muralism long popular in Mexico.
    Tributes quickly followed news of his death.
    Cuevas attacked leading 20th century muralists such as Diego Rivera, Jose Clemente Orozco and David Alfaro Siqueiros, accusing them of being too close to the government and showing Mexican life from behind a "cactus curtain" as he called it.
    Often styling himself as a "gato macho", or tomcat, his provocative manner earned him lasting enmity from foes and once reportedly led to machine gun fire being directed at his home.
    He married his first wife, Bertha Riestra in 1961, but the raffish, handsome Cuevas earned a reputation as a ladies' man, claiming to have had hundreds of sexual encounters.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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