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Danilo De los Santos
painting award at the E. León Jimenes Contest (1964) shaggy hair people depicted in an expressionist style by
when he organized his showing in 1965, the year of the schematic black lines adding drama to the scenes. Two
capital city revolution that started on April 24th, focused characters show the insatiable hunger while the third, a
on the Colonial Zone. Lepe witnessed the military event female, shows her need for food in a silent way. The com-
and painted «To the humanity in pain,» of which, the position is prominent, especially on its range of colours:
critic Valldeperes writes, and adds: «Without deliberately the bright red, shaded on the table cloth where three fruit
making social painting -in the exact meaning of the term- one slides rest, the eroded blue and the white that strengthen
can see on his figurations a long and sharp stroke, resembling the general trio’s symmetry, and the green at the centre,
the humanity in pain (…) A composition, moderately thick, the same as the entire watermelon in the shadow, under
that proclaims his dedication to the material’s plasticity, not the table, that ends up creating a square on a symmetric
with morbidity, but with love and balanced emotion instead.» composition with conceptual asymmetries.
On the visual discourse «Agony,» the painter is a settled
expressionist, apart from expressing the constructionist José Rincón Mora. (Cotuí, 1937). His family moved
synthesis on his energetic, dramatic and dynamic com-
position. to Neyba, a town of the southwestern and barren land-
scape where he received basic education with Francis-
Cándido Bidó. (Bonao, 1936-2011). Of a humble so- can priests, and where, from 8 to 15 years old, he was
influenced by Catholicism, sacred images and readings
cial and provincial origin, he moves to the capital city to of great authors of the Spanish Renaissance. These ex-
work at the Serafín de Asís College. The nuns supported periences led him to enter the seminary where he spent
his studies at the Fine Arts National School, where he a year, but later on realized that being a priest was not
graduated in 1962. Very soon he has individual showings, his vocation. In 1957 he entered the University of Santo
form the group «The Three» in 1963 with Elsa Núñez y Domingo where he studied architecture, and also be-
Lepe, takes part on national events and collective exhibi- came part of the National School of Fine Arts, where
tions attracting the critics attention due to his discourse his teachers were Jaime Colson, Gilberto Hernández Or-
novelty, his technic of solid and texturized colours and tega, Marianela Jiménez and Eligio Pichardo. In 1962 he
his primitivist expressionism. He studied with Gilberto holds his first solo exhibition, featuring landscapes and
Hernández Ortega, José Gausachs, Clara Ledesma and portraits that include the topic of altar boys, which turn
Jaime Colson. With the later, he works as assistant in- out to be portraits of himself, or self-portraits. A scholar-
structor of mural painting. ship for further and new studies in Germany, granted in
1964, allows him to move to Munich, where he gradu-
1965 was a vital year for him, when he obtained ates with an art degree.
the First Prize at the Young Artists ESSO Salon, held
in Washington with the presence of Latin American art- «Portrait of Ann,» oil/canvas, 68x38 cm., 1963. The no-
ists under 40 years old. The Dominican representation ticeable lengthening of the portrait allows us to appreci-
included Gilberto Hernández Ortega (Painting Award), ate a connection with El Greco and the Spanish Baroque,
Domingo Liz (Sculpture Award) and Cándido Bidó, in this case defined with a modern vision under the in-
who submitted two works: «Student prisoners» and «Late fluence of his master Hernández Ortega, among others.
lunch,» the winner piece. The refined chromatic mannerism and the expressionist
distillation, reveal a temperamental artist, with a master-
«Eating Watermelons,» oil/canvas, 100x80 cm., 1965. This ship and a juvenile or early pictorial development.
painting is part of a series in which the human beings are
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