Alfredo Ramos Martínez

Alfredo Ramos Martinez

October 1, 1991 through January 6, 1992

In conjunction with Los Angeles' Artes de Mexico festival and the Los Angeles Country Museum of Art' "Mexico: Splendors of 30 Centuries" exhibition, Louis Stern Galleries presents a retrospective exhibition of the work of Alfredo Ramos Martinez. The exhibition will travel to Mexico's Museo Nacional de Arte in the spring.

Less familiar than the names of other important Mexican artists-Siqueiros, Rivera, Orozco - Ramos Martinez's career spanned nearly five decades. He knew success in his native Mexico, France, and the United States. His was a fundamentally independent spirit, which may account for his being overshadowed by those Mexican artists who chose to align themselves with a particular political ideology, and generated much controversy as a result of that choice. Ramos Martinez was never tempted by politics, nor by the avant-garde in Paris where he spent fourteen years. Instead he pursued his unique vision, remaining independent of the many "isms" which seduced so many of his contemporaries.

His rejection of any system that would confine an artist's individuality was first manifested at the early age of twelve when he was admitted to Mexico's Academia Nacional De Bellas Arte in 1884. He refused to spend his days drawing from plaster casts, insisting instead on going out into the streets to sketch ordinary people at their ordinary tasks.

The artist's first move toward recognition outside of Mexico came in 1894 when Phoebe Apperson Hearst agreed to support his studies in Paris. She had been impressed by his menu decoration for a state dinner she attended given by Mexican President Porfirio Diaz.

As in childhood, his Paris studies took place, not primarily in the classroom, but in the museums and, again, in the streets. It was at this time, during a trip to Brittany, that Ramos Martinez first painted on newspaper. What began as reluctant necessity (he had run out of drawing paper) became the basis of an independent and unusual style of painting. Several works in this medium wil be on display at Louis Stern Galleries.
Some years after returning to Mexico in 1910 Ramos Martinez became director of the National School of Fine Arts. He immediately initiated his most important contribution as a teacher, the Escuelas de Pintura al Aire Libre, or Schools of Outdoor Painting. Among his many students were David Alfaro Siqueiros and Rufino Tamayo.

After much success as a teacher, Ramos Martinez resigned to devote himself full-time to painting. Eventually he relocated to Los Angeles, where he was responsible for the creation of numerous important murals for private homes and public spaces. There were also several major exhibitions, including those at the Dalzel Hatfield Galleries, and at the Fine Arts Foundation of Scripps College before and after the artist died in 1946.

As implied by this brief biography, the subjects that Ramos Martinez chose to paint were usually humble. However the peasants and workers who populate his paintings often seem to assume the status of icons. This is due in part to his manner of stylization which serves to universalize his subjects, granting depth and religious significance to the seemingly mundane tasks in which they are engaged. It was Ramos Martinez' special gift to express such humanity, such humility, and such grandeur at the same moment. This is true of the smaller easel paintings, and also of the monumental canvases, generally single portraits in which the figure is transformed into a peasant deity, at once individual and omnipresent.

A catalogue including biographical and historical texts as wel as adetailed chronology wil be published in conjunction with the exhibition. Also, Margarita Nieto, Smithsonian Senior Postdoctoral Fellow at the Archives of American Art, wil be giving a talk on Ramos Martinez at the gallery on Thursday October 10 at 7:30pm. Dr. Nieto has done extensive research on the influence of Mexican artists on the California aesthetic. The public is invited.