Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Painting
The Dominican art scene today is quite healthy, thanks in no small part to dictator Rafael
Trujillo. Although his 31 years of authoritarian rule in many ways negated the essence of
creative freedom, Trujillo had a warm place in his heart for painting, and in 1942 he estab-
lished the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes (National School of Fine Arts). Fine Dominic-
an artwork predates the school, but it really wasn't until the institution's doors opened that
Dominican art underwent definitive development.
If the artwork looks distinctly Spanish, it's because the influence is undeniable. During
the Spanish Civil War (1936-39), many artists fled Franco's fascist regime to start new
lives in the Dominican Republic. Influential artists include Manolo Pascual, José Gausachs,
José Vela-Zanetti, Eugenio Fernández Granell and José Fernández Corredor.
In the late 1960s in Santiago, Grupo Friordano, as well as other small groups of socially
engaged artists, began politically conscious and ideological aesthetic movements. Painters
like Daniel Henriquez, Orlando Menicucci and Yori Morjel considered their work as en-
gaged critiques of society; Morjel painted traditional rural scenes and helped develop a dis-
tinctly Dominican vernacular style.
If you visit any of the art galleries in Santo Domingo or Santiago, keep an eye out for
Cándido Bidó's bright, colorful paintings of scenes from his native Cibao valley (Bidó
passed away in 2011); Adriana Billini Gautreau, who is famous for portraits that are rich in
expressionist touches; the cubist forms of Jaime Colson, emphasizing the social crises of
his day; Luis Desangles, considered the forerunner of folklore in Dominican painting;
Mariano Eckert, representing the realism of everyday life; Juan Bautista Gómez, whose
paintings depict the sensuality of the landscape; Guillo Pérez, whose works of oxen, carts
and canefields convey a poetic vision of life at the sugar mill; Ivan Tovar's surrealist Dali-
esque works; the traditional realist paintings of Ada Balcacer; Mariam Balcacer, a photo-
grapher who lives in Italy; the steel sculptures of Johnny Bonnelleg Ricart; and, finally, the
enigmatic and dream-like paintings of Dionisio Blanco.
Also well represented is what's known as 'primitive art' - Dominican and Haitian paint-
ings that convey rural Caribbean life with simple and colorful figures and landscapes.
These paintings are created by amateur painters - some would say skilled craftsmen - who
reproduce the same painting hundreds of times. They are sold everywhere there are tour-
ists; you're sure to get an eyeful regardless of the length of your trip.
A good resource on Dominican art is the authoritative
Enciclopedia de las Artes Plástic-
as Dominicanas
(Encyclopedia of Dominican Visual Arts) by Cándido Gerón. Illustrations
