Rufino Tamayo (Mexico, 1899-1991)

 
La Venus Dorada (1955)
oil on canvas 99.7 x 79.7 cm

Rufino Tamayo was a Mexican painter, printmaker, and graphic artist known for his abstracted and expressive figurative style. He was born in 1899 in Oaxaca, Mexico, and began his art studies at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes in Mexico City. Tamayo is considered one of the leading figures of the Mexican modernist movement, along with artists such as Diego Rivera, José Clemente Orozco, and David Alfaro Siqueiros.

Tamayo's work often featured bold, bright colors and thick, expressive brushstrokes. He was particularly interested in exploring indigenous themes and motifs in his art, and he often incorporated elements of pre-Columbian art into his compositions. Tamayo also experimented with different media, including painting, printmaking, and sculpture, and his work can be found in major museums and collections around the world.

Tamayo was also a vocal critic of the Mexican government and its policies, and he used his art to address social and political issues in Mexico. In the 1940s, he left Mexico and lived and worked in New York City for a time before returning to Mexico in the 1960s. Tamayo continued to produce art until his death in 1991, and his legacy as a pioneering Mexican modernist endures to this day.