Carlos Mauricio Valenti Perrillat
Encyclopedia
Carlos Mauricio Valenti Perrillat (b. Paris
, November 15, 1888 – d. Paris
, October 29, 1912) was a French
-born painter
, who worked predominantly in Guatemala
. An artist with the gift of an undeniable talent who, in spite of living within the moral repressions and strict conventional customs of a Guatemalan time outlined by a dictatorship (Manuel Estrada Cabrera
), he was able to develop one of the most important works for the art history in the 20th century. He is considered as pioneer of modern Guatemalan art.
on November 15, 1888, he was the third son of Carlos Valenti Sorie, born in Italy
, and Helena Perrillat-Bottonet, born in Le Grand Bornand, Haute-Savoie, France
. Valenti arrived to Guatemala together with his mother and two brothers to join his father, who was already living in the country since 1888. Since he was a child, he stood out as a brilliant and ingenious student, and was awarded a gold medal as the best student. He was the favorite piano student of professor Herculano Alvarado. Later on, as a student at the Fine Arts Academy, he awed professor Santiago González because of his excellent drawing ability.
Valenti was part of a group of artists, poets, and writers like Carlos Wyld Ospina
, Rafael Rodríguez Padilla
, Rafael Arévalo Martínez
, Rafael Yela Günther
, the De la Riva siblings and Carlos Mérida
, who worked very closely with Jaime Sabartés, Catalonian who came to Guatemala from Barcelona
, who held a close friendship with Pablo Picasso
, and worked as his private secretary since 1935. Among that group of gifted artists, Valenti was like the lighthouse that illuminated everything, who knew how to be a friend and who became one of the masters. At 22, he already had what was called “a style”. His authentic genius expressed itself from his beginnings without hesitation, without wavering. For the time Valenti lived in, his work had an unlimited daring boldness. Since he took the pencil, his stroke was categorical and final.
Through his art, Valenti’s art expressed a feeling, transmitting his own internal vision. During his learning stage, his work was samples of skill and ability using academic models supported on traditional methods. It is precisely in his oil landscape paintings where we find a gentle Valenti, and in contradiction with a suicidal figure of his last days.
The harmony of his color and the simplification process of his brush strokes recall the spirit that motivated the Impressionists school. His drawings and his hues with uncommon topics for that time define Valenti as a singular artist, in whom the searching spirit of conflicts that originate our existence was born. Some have considered him as the first expressionist in the Guatemalan painting.
In 1912, together with painter Carlos Mérida
, Valenti traveled to Paris
, France, to continue studying painting. Shortly after his arrival, they visited Pablo Picasso
to hand him a letter from Jaime Sabartés, referring them to him for his guidance in choosing an academy or a master for their painting classes. That is how both registered at the Vitty Academy, where they became disciples of the Dutch Kees Van Dongen
and the Spanish Hermenegildo Anglada Camarasa
.
In time, Carlos Valenti started to notice that his diabetes
, which he had suffered since very young, was affecting his vision more every day. Upon consultation with a specialist in Paris
, he ordered him to rest and stay completely away from painting. This situation immersed him in a deep depression when all his plans became frustrated, and when he lost the main reason of his existence: Art.
Two years before he had written: “… there are some among us that have the real faith – Art – for which you have to sacrifice yourself stepping over everything, to whom you have to render homage as a deity, give everything up for it; live only for your work… there, in the canvas, deposit an entire life, all our love; transmit to the painting everything that cannot be explained; live in it, deposit all our being, all the most saintly emotions that the artists’ heart experiences..”
His end was tragic, as other artists’ ends were. When he was unable to devote himself totally to his passion – art – on October 29, 1912, he cut short his live with two shots to his chest. He was buried at the Montparnasse cemetery
in a cold and rainy November morning.
Some of his works belong to the collection of the Museo Nacional de Arte Moderno "Carlos Mérida"
in Guatemala City
.
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, November 15, 1888 – d. Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, October 29, 1912) was a French
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
-born painter
Painting
Painting is the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a surface . The application of the medium is commonly applied to the base with a brush but other objects can be used. In art, the term painting describes both the act and the result of the action. However, painting is...
, who worked predominantly in Guatemala
Guatemala
Guatemala is a country in Central America bordered by Mexico to the north and west, the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, Belize to the northeast, the Caribbean to the east, and Honduras and El Salvador to the southeast...
. An artist with the gift of an undeniable talent who, in spite of living within the moral repressions and strict conventional customs of a Guatemalan time outlined by a dictatorship (Manuel Estrada Cabrera
Manuel Estrada Cabrera
Manuel José Estrada Cabrera was President of Guatemala from 8 February 1898 to 15 April 1920.Manuel Estrada forcibly took the presidency after the assassination of José María Reina. The Guatemalan cabinet called an emergency meeting to appoint a new successor, but declined to invite the General...
), he was able to develop one of the most important works for the art history in the 20th century. He is considered as pioneer of modern Guatemalan art.
Biography
Born in ParisParis
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
on November 15, 1888, he was the third son of Carlos Valenti Sorie, born in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, and Helena Perrillat-Bottonet, born in Le Grand Bornand, Haute-Savoie, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
. Valenti arrived to Guatemala together with his mother and two brothers to join his father, who was already living in the country since 1888. Since he was a child, he stood out as a brilliant and ingenious student, and was awarded a gold medal as the best student. He was the favorite piano student of professor Herculano Alvarado. Later on, as a student at the Fine Arts Academy, he awed professor Santiago González because of his excellent drawing ability.
Valenti was part of a group of artists, poets, and writers like Carlos Wyld Ospina
Carlos Wyld Ospina
Carlos Wyld Ospina was a Guatemalan novelist, essayist and poet.- Biography :...
, Rafael Rodríguez Padilla
Rafael Rodríguez Padilla
Rafael Rodríguez Padilla was a Guatemalan painter, printmaker and sculptor. In 1920 he was cofounder and became the first director of the Guatemalan Academia Nacional de Bellas Artes , which merged into the Escuela Nacional de Artes Plásticas "Rafael Rodríguez Padilla".Rodríguez studied sculpture...
, Rafael Arévalo Martínez
Rafael Arévalo Martínez
Rafael Arévalo Martínez was a Guatemalan writer: a novelist, short-story writer, poet, diplomat, and director of Guatemala’s national library for more than 20 years...
, Rafael Yela Günther
Rafael Yela Günther
Rafael Yela Günther was a Guatemalan painter and sculptor.- Biography :...
, the De la Riva siblings and Carlos Mérida
Carlos Merida
Carlos Mérida was a Guatemalan artist.-Early life:Mérida was born in Guatemala City to a family from Quetzaltenango, boasting a Maya and Zapotec heritage which was often an inspiration in his art. He began studying music but became hearing-impaired due to illness. He then changed to the visual arts...
, who worked very closely with Jaime Sabartés, Catalonian who came to Guatemala from Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
, who held a close friendship with Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
, and worked as his private secretary since 1935. Among that group of gifted artists, Valenti was like the lighthouse that illuminated everything, who knew how to be a friend and who became one of the masters. At 22, he already had what was called “a style”. His authentic genius expressed itself from his beginnings without hesitation, without wavering. For the time Valenti lived in, his work had an unlimited daring boldness. Since he took the pencil, his stroke was categorical and final.
Through his art, Valenti’s art expressed a feeling, transmitting his own internal vision. During his learning stage, his work was samples of skill and ability using academic models supported on traditional methods. It is precisely in his oil landscape paintings where we find a gentle Valenti, and in contradiction with a suicidal figure of his last days.
The harmony of his color and the simplification process of his brush strokes recall the spirit that motivated the Impressionists school. His drawings and his hues with uncommon topics for that time define Valenti as a singular artist, in whom the searching spirit of conflicts that originate our existence was born. Some have considered him as the first expressionist in the Guatemalan painting.
In 1912, together with painter Carlos Mérida
Carlos Merida
Carlos Mérida was a Guatemalan artist.-Early life:Mérida was born in Guatemala City to a family from Quetzaltenango, boasting a Maya and Zapotec heritage which was often an inspiration in his art. He began studying music but became hearing-impaired due to illness. He then changed to the visual arts...
, Valenti traveled to Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, France, to continue studying painting. Shortly after his arrival, they visited Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso
Pablo Diego José Francisco de Paula Juan Nepomuceno María de los Remedios Cipriano de la Santísima Trinidad Ruiz y Picasso known as Pablo Ruiz Picasso was a Spanish expatriate painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist, and stage designer, one of the greatest and most influential artists of the...
to hand him a letter from Jaime Sabartés, referring them to him for his guidance in choosing an academy or a master for their painting classes. That is how both registered at the Vitty Academy, where they became disciples of the Dutch Kees Van Dongen
Kees van Dongen
Cornelis Theodorus Maria van Dongen , usually known as Kees van Dongen or just Van Dongen, was a Dutch painter and one of the Fauves. He gained a reputation for his sensuous, at times garish, portraits....
and the Spanish Hermenegildo Anglada Camarasa
Hermenegildo Anglada Camarasa
Hermenegildo Anglada Camarasa , known in Catalan as Hermenegild Anglada Caramasa, was a Spanish Balearic painter.Born in Barcelona, he studied there at the Llotja School...
.
In time, Carlos Valenti started to notice that his diabetes
Diabetes mellitus
Diabetes mellitus, often simply referred to as diabetes, is a group of metabolic diseases in which a person has high blood sugar, either because the body does not produce enough insulin, or because cells do not respond to the insulin that is produced...
, which he had suffered since very young, was affecting his vision more every day. Upon consultation with a specialist in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
, he ordered him to rest and stay completely away from painting. This situation immersed him in a deep depression when all his plans became frustrated, and when he lost the main reason of his existence: Art.
Two years before he had written: “… there are some among us that have the real faith – Art – for which you have to sacrifice yourself stepping over everything, to whom you have to render homage as a deity, give everything up for it; live only for your work… there, in the canvas, deposit an entire life, all our love; transmit to the painting everything that cannot be explained; live in it, deposit all our being, all the most saintly emotions that the artists’ heart experiences..”
His end was tragic, as other artists’ ends were. When he was unable to devote himself totally to his passion – art – on October 29, 1912, he cut short his live with two shots to his chest. He was buried at the Montparnasse cemetery
Montparnasse Cemetery
Montparnasse Cemetery is a cemetery in the Montparnasse quarter of Paris, part of the city's 14th arrondissement.-History:Created from three farms in 1824, the cemetery at Montparnasse was originally known as Le Cimetière du Sud. Cemeteries had been banned from Paris since the closure, owing to...
in a cold and rainy November morning.
Some of his works belong to the collection of the Museo Nacional de Arte Moderno "Carlos Mérida"
Museo Nacional de Arte Moderno "Carlos Mérida"
The Museo Nacional de Arte Moderno "Carlos Mérida" is a national museum of modern art in Guatemala City, named after Carlos Mérida.- History :The current museum was established in 1975...
in Guatemala City
Guatemala City
Guatemala City , is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Guatemala and Central America...
.