Melecio Galvan (1945 - 1982)
Figures, 1968
Sepia on paper
18 x 22 inches
Signed and dated lower right
Provenance:
Estate of the artist
Melecio Galván (San Rafael, Mexico, 1945 - 1982) was a Mexican draughtsman who was little-known during his lifetime. This is principally because he was a socio-politically committed artist wary of the commercial gallery circuit as well as art institutions controlled by the state. He arose from a working-class family in San Rafael, on the outskirts of Mexico City, and died under mysterious circumstances in that town at the age of 37, just when he was reaching the apogee of his mature style. Galván studied at the Academia San Carlos in Mexico City between 1965 and 1968. His preferred medium was ink on paper, and he created page upon page of sketchbooks filled with drawings. The major themes he developed in his work were reinterpretations of classical drawings of the human figure and anatomy studies, explorations of the grotesque, and themes related to the socio-political situation in Mexico, especially following the 1968 Tlateloco Massacre. In 1971-72, he traveled to Northern California where he collaborated on a mural in Fresno and created illustrations for the Latino journal Basta Ya (Enough Already) in San Francisco. Back in Mexico City, from 1977 to 1981 he was a member of the Grupo MIRA, primarily comprised of printmakers who favored themes of politics and social justice...
Category
1960s Art by Medium: Pigment
