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Rafael Ferrer Art

Puerto Rican, b. 1933

As an artist with an oeuvre as varied and colorful as his sources of inspiration, Rafael Ferrer’s work defies categorization. His long career has seen him explore the roles of figurative painter, conceptual artist and musician, and his relationship with his birthplace, Puerto Rico, has remained at the heart of each.

One of Ferrer’s classmates in the early 1950s showed him a book on modern art while he was pursuing a degree in music at Syracuse University in New York. A few years later, he returned to Puerto Rico and enrolled at Universidad de Puerto Rico, where he studied painting under Spanish Surrealist Eugenio Fernández Granell.

Ferrer visited Europe with Granell in 1954 and befriended Cuban painter Wifredo Lam as well as French writer André Breton, who is known as the leader of the Surrealist movement. Ferrer developed a deep interest in Surrealism as well as Afro-Caribbean music and culture, and the prominent artistic figures he gained as mentors and friends would have a significant impact on his work in the years that followed. Later, as Ferrer moved to New York City and across the northeastern United States, he would examine the stereotypical imagery of the tropics in popular culture and attempt to subvert it in his work.

Ferrer has worked in sculpture, printmaking, drawing and more, and his choice of material has included everything from gourds to leaves to paper bags. In the 1960s and ’70s, he made improvisational process-oriented sculpture that saw an integration of materials such as corrugated steel and ice and created narrative installations that occupied entire rooms. His bold work has regularly referenced the sprawling impacts of colonization. He painted and drew on the kind of navigational charts and maps that would have been employed by seafaring explorers, and his Dos Pinas Secas (“Two Dry Pineapples”) depicts the fruit that Christopher Columbus brought back to Europe from Guadeloupe, which was seen as a symbol of hospitality before it represented prosperity and prestige.

After seeing Alex Katz paint on the beach during the mid-’70s, Ferrer returned to painting. His vivid and colorful oil paintings of the 1980s and ’90s depict everyday scenes in the tropics, such as marketplace vendors, women shopping and fishing boats on a beach, but are also marked by examinations of societal and political issues. Ferrer’s works can be found in the collections of the Guggenheim, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and other institutions.

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Artist: Rafael Ferrer
"Sin Fin"

"Sin Fin"

By Rafael Ferrer

Located in Lyons, CO

Color woodcut. Rafael Ferrer depicts the intense life of the Caribbean in his paintings and prints. With hot colors, deep shadows and mysterious ...

Category

1990s Contemporary Rafael Ferrer Art

Materials

Woodcut

Recodo

Recodo

By Rafael Ferrer

Located in Lyons, CO

Color lithograph, Ed. 25. Rafael Ferrer depicts the intense life of the Caribbean in his paintings and prints. With hot colors, deep shadows and mysterious relationships among his f...

Category

1980s Contemporary Rafael Ferrer Art

Materials

Lithograph

Mercado

Mercado

By Rafael Ferrer

Located in Lyons, CO

Color monotype. Rafael Ferrer depicts the intense life of the Caribbean in his paintings and prints. With hot colors, deep shadows and mysterious relationships among his figures, Fe...

Category

1990s Contemporary Rafael Ferrer Art

Materials

Monotype

Haiti II

Haiti II

By Rafael Ferrer

Located in Lyons, CO

Color monotype. Rafael Ferrer depicts the intense life of the Caribbean in his paintings and prints. With hot colors, deep shadows and mysterious relationships among his figures, Fe...

Category

1990s Contemporary Rafael Ferrer Art

Materials

Monotype

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Rafael Ferrer art for sale on 1stDibs.

Find a wide variety of authentic Rafael Ferrer art available for sale on 1stDibs. You can also browse by medium to find art by Rafael Ferrer in lithograph, monotype, woodcut print and more. Much of the original work by this artist or collective was created during the 20th century and is mostly associated with the contemporary style. Not every interior allows for large Rafael Ferrer art, so small editions measuring 18 inches across are available. Customers who are interested in this artist might also find the work of Hughie Lee-Smith, Tony Bennett, and Corita Kent. Rafael Ferrer art prices can differ depending upon medium, time period and other attributes. On 1stDibs, the price for these items starts at $1,200 and tops out at $5,500, while the average work can sell for $3,500.