Cuevas, José Luis – Mexico

BIOGRAPHY OF JOSÉ LUIS CUEVAS

The story goes that José Luis Cuevas was born and raised in a pencil and paper factory run by his grandfather, and the artist himself has commented on this as being somehow a decisive factor in his life.

Totally self-taught, he took his first steps in the fine arts when he was a child, painting urban scenes with materials from his grandfather’s factory. At the age of 9 he entered the Escuela de la Esmeralda, a fine arts school belonging to the National Institute of Fine Arts and open to the public.

In 1946 he fell ill with rheumatic fever, and was subsequently bedridden for two years. He left school and entered Mexico City College (currently Universidad de las Américas Puebla), where he continued his training during his illness. Here he took printmaking classes with Lola Cueto.

At the age of 14, he rented a space where he was to set up his studio and continue training and working on his pieces, continuing to be self-taught. He did different jobs and illustrated newspapers to pay the bills.

A key event in his life was a visit to the La Castañeda Insane Asylum, where his brother worked as a psychiatrist. Here, Cuevas was to come into contact with a social reality that would fascinate him immensely. The themes that the artist focuses on most in his works include human degradation, despotism, and prostitution.

José Luis Cuevas achieved recognition as an international artist, holding exhibitions in the United States and Europe.

JOSÉ LUIS CUEVAS’ WORK

José Luis Cuevas was a draftsman, painter, writer, engraver, sculptor and illustrator, and one of the first to openly position himself against the Mexican school within the Breakaway Generation. As a neo-figurative artist, he included human figures in his work, but moved away from realism to create pieces with great expressive content.

Cuevas’ work focuses on the human being, on our individuality, but also on an analysis of society from a critical viewpoint. His art thereby becomes an emblem for the visibility of groups discriminated against by society.

The people depicted in his works are generally on the margins of society; they are mentally ill, alcoholics, prostitutes… His themes are suffering, anguish, misery, and what is considered the scourge of society. His intention is to make them visible through his work.

A key characteristic of Cuevas’ language is the deformation of the faces, which can appear semi-demonic. He sometimes uses this resource to create anonymous and dehumanised figures; on other occasions it expresses the ugliness of the “soul” of human beings through their physical features; and on others it has been interpreted as a physical representation of the internal torments resulting from mental illness, in relation to the illustrations he produced in psychiatric hospitals.

Silvia Sánchez Ruiz
Curator