Art of María Izquierdo

Best known for her engaging portraits and sensuous still lifes, Mexican artist Maria Izquierdo (1902-1955) created a remarkable body of work that is deeply personal and profoundly affecting; yet she has often been overlooked amid the muralists who were her contemporaries.While European modernism was important to Izquierdo, Mexico's traditional culture, popular arts, and rural landscapes provided her with a lifelong source of subjects. Her numerous paintings lovingly depict the foods and hand-crafted objects used in popular ritual and devotion. In her later life, she produced a number of hauntingly surreal compositions that show vibrant tableaux of typically Mexican foods before barren, somber-hued landscapes with unusually deep perspectives.This book, based on the first comprehensive presentation of her oeuvre in New York, confirms Izquierdo's place in the history of Mexican art. In addition to bringing together some sixty outstanding paintings and works on paper by the artist, the book features three essays on her life and work: curator Elizabeth Ferrer presents an overview of Izquierdo's oeuvre; art historian Olivier Debroise analyzes the artistic relationship between Izquierdo and her mentor Rufino Tamayo, and Elena Poniatowski explores Izquierdo's position as a woman in the Mexican art world.