Rafael Coronel Estudio materida 1961 oil on board 19.5 h x 25.5 w in (50 x 65 cm) Signed, titled and dated to lower right 'R Coronel 61 Mex Estudio Materida'. Provenance: Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, MI | Private Collection This work will ship from Lambertville, New Jersey.
Artist: Rafael Coronel, Mexican (1931 - 2019) Title: Portrait XII from Galeria de Arte Misrachi Portfolio Year: 1978 Medium: Offset Lithograph, signed in the plate Edition: 2000 Size: 24.5 x 19 in. (62.23 x 48.26 cm)
Artist: Rafael Coronel, Mexican (1931 - 2019) Title: Portrait XIV from Galeria de Arte Misrachi Portfolio Year: 1978 Medium: Offset Lithograph, signed in the plate Edition: 2000 Size: 24.5 x 19 in. (62.23 x 48.26 cm)
Rafael Coronel Mexican, (1932 - 2019) portrait of a child graphite on paper Signed lower right. Biography from the Archives of askART by Jeffrey Morseburg: Rafael Coronel is one of Mexico's most recognized artists and a major figure in Mexican cultural life and, especially the life of his native state of Zacatecas. While he came of age in an era when the Mexican Muralists dominated the Mexican art scene and as abstraction was just becoming popular, he followed his own path, finding inspiration in sources as diverse as the work of the El Greco (1541-1614), the Baroque Era, as well as the works of Francisco Goya (1746-1828) and Francis Bacon (1909-1992). In his iconic works he has forged a style where his subjects seemed to be suspended between fantasy and reality. Coronel's works have been exhibited frequently in Mexico and the United States and in recent years, he was the subject of a large retrospective at the Palacio de Bella Artes in Mexico City. Rafael Coronel was born in the mining city of Zacatecas, capital of the State of Zacatecas, in North-Central Mexico. He grew up in the heart of Zacatecas, surrounded by the grandeur of the Spanish Colonial buildings that were built with the immense profits drawn from the silver mines that pepper the hills. As a young man he was bathed in the tumultuous revolutionary history of the region and introduced to the folk art of the indigenous peoples and the Mexican Mural Tradition. The Coronels were an artistic upper-middle class family and his mother played the violin and his father the clarinet and the violin. On Sundays the family would get together and play folk music. Rafael's rebellious older brother, Pedro Colonel (1922-1985), was an artistic prodigy, who moved to Mexico City to study at the Escuela Nacional de Pintura, Escuela y Grabado, known coliqually as "La Esmeralda," when he was only thirteen. While his brother was studying under Diego Rivera (1886-1957), Jose Clemente Orozco (1883-1949) and Francisco Zuniga (1912-1998), Rafael, the youngest child, dreamed of being a football (soccer) star. Although he was artistically talented, he did not see art as a possible vocation, for he saw art as an impossible way of making a living and supporting a family. To further his education, Coronel moved to Mexico City in 1951, where he lived in with his older sister and her husband. He first intended to study accounting, then began the architecture program at UNAM (Universidad Nacional Autonma de Mexico). However, soon after his arrival in the Mexican capital, he began painting in earnest. In 1952 he entered an early work - Mujer de Jerez (Women of Jerez) - in the Concurso de Artes Plasticas (Contest of the Plastic Arts) from the Instituto Nacional de la Juventad Mexico (Youth Institute of Mexico). Coronel won first prize in the Concurso and was awarded a stipend and a scholarship to study at La Esmeralda, where his brother had matriculated. When he began his studies in Mexico City, he was a provincial, so green that when he was confronted with his first nude model, he says that he "didn't know whether to stay or not, because in Zacatecas, we always kept our clothes on." However, in spite of his inexperience, the aspiring artist already had a strong sense of direction, and he rebelled against his teacher Carlos Orozco Romero (1896-1984) and was soon expelled. Many of the younger artists saw the influence of the Mexican Muralists as oppressive and even at the earliest point in his career, Colonel saw art as a means of personal expression, not a conduit for political or social messages. Coronel became one of the young painters of the Generacion de la Ruptura (The Rupture Generation), who felt that the Escula Mexicana de la Pintura (The Mexican School of Painting), was too cozy with the government and had become a nationalistic, politically correct form of "official art" that prevented younger painters with diverse viewpoints from establishing themselves. His contemporary Jose Luis Cuevas (b. 1934), may have been the most outspoken opponent of the muralists and their repression of other artists, which he referred to as "the cactus curtain." Rafael Coronel's first major exhibition was at the Galerie de Arte de Mexico in 1954. As he developed his personal style, he looked back to the work of the Renaissance and the Baroque Era for inspiration, seeking a manner of expression that was free of dogma. He sought to create art that reflected his own time and feelings, but paintings that were inspired by the mystery and majesty of past masters. From the beginning, his work - like that of many other painters of his Ruptura Genercion (the Generation of the Rupture) - drew both praise and condemnation. While some of Coronel's early work included both figurative and abstract elements, he only ventured into pure abstraction for a short time. In the late 1950s, completing an abstract mural at the INAH (Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia, the National Institute of History and Anthropology) library. In his early years as an artist, Coronel seemed to be searching for a consistent style, a way of working where he could express himself symbolically and metaphorically, rather than in the narrative manner that was oppressively popular at the time. His early drawings are quite beautiful, focusing on the simplified and sometimes blocky figures of Mexican peasants, where line is emphasized over volume or tonality. Some of Colonel's works featured Picasso-like heads painted in colors that would make a Fauvist blush, while other distorted figures were reminiscent of the work of Francis Bacon (1909-1992). However, from the formative years of his career onward, the young painter had a protean work ethic, so he drew and painted unceasingly and his art developed rapidly. By the early 1960s, he found his artistic footing and since then he has always focused on the figurative, depicting his subjects against simplified backgrounds, rejecting the context that was so important to the previous generation of Mexican artists. He did not silhouette his figures against a tapestry of politically-charges icons, so to paraphrase Coronel, he did not pose his men with flowers (Rivera), flags (Siqueiros) or fire (Orozco). In 1959, Coronel fell in love with Ruth Rivera (1926-1969), the youngest daughter of Diego Rivera, the most iconic figure of Mexican Art, who had died two years earlier. Ruth was the oldest of the two daughters that Rivera had with his second wife, the tempestuous model and novelist Guadalupe "Lupe" Marin (1895-1983), whom he left for Freda Kahlo in 1929. A young Ruth Rivera was immortalized by her father in a famous portrait in 1949. Rafael Coronel and Ruth Rivera were married in 1960 and before her untimely death in 1969, they had a single child, Juan Coronel Rivera, now an important curator. In 1961, Coronel traveled to Europe for the first time. Although he was familiar with classical European art from books and from the works in the museums at home, actually seeing the most iconic works in the western canon was a revelation. Coronel found himself influenced by the works of El Greco, Velasquez, Caravaggio and Rembrandt, but it was the rebellious, melancholy spirit of Francisco Goya that truly inspired him. In Goya, Coronel found another loner, a man whose insights into the foibles, failings and follies of the human condition spoke to him and he returned to Mexico with a renewed energy and enthusiasm for his art. As Coronel's work matured, he drew inspiration from classical art, but combined this classical influence with illusory effects and a moody, mysterious aura permeated his work. Perhaps the best word to describe Coronel's evolving artistic world would be fantasmagorico, or "phantasmagorical" in English, for Coronel's paintings were filled with shadowy and incongruous imagery, a sometimes disturbing world where nothing was stated outright, where everything was open to interpretation. If we look back at the paintings of the Francisco de Zurbaran (1598-1664), especially his most inspired religious work, we can see that there has been a long tradition of the phantasmagorical in Spanish Art. And Mexico, with its melding of pagan cultures with Spanish Catholicism, was a fertile womb (setting) for Coronel's fantastic, suspenseful art. In the 1970s, Coronel painted a series of figurative works that were strongly reminiscent of the Counter-Reformation works of Jusepe de Ribera (1591-1662). Some of them were sorrowful men in contemporary clothing, but others were his now familiar cassock-clad men and boys, peasant women and men with horses. His subjects were all earthy people, with dirt ground into their faces and hands, reminiscent of the revolutionary works of artists of the early 17th century who used the desperate people of the streets as models, rather than the high-born. These dramatic, pensive figures were depicted against yellow and reddish backgrounds, often with a warm aura around them. Coronels work of the 1970s could be haunting, even disturbing. He painted large paintings of the lowly rat, who lives his life in the shadows. His rats were not of the tame variety found it pet stores but the angry, aggressive rat of the sewer. Asked about these works, he recently said that "Man is like a rat and when he falls into the trap of art, he cannot escape." So, the rat was an ideal denizen of Coronel's unique artistic universe. In the 1970s, he forged a long, fruitful relationship with the American dealer Bernard Lewin (1906-2003), the most active dealer and most prolific collector of Mexican Art. Lewin hosted successful exhibitions for Coronel in Beverly Hills and Palm Springs. In 1997, when Lewin finally retired and closed his gallery, he and his wife Edith donated his landmark collection to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, a selection of Coronel's work was part of the bequest. In 1981 Coronel opened a studio in Cuernavaca, the capital of the state of Morelos, where many wealthy Mexicans have their summer homes. The ancient Olmec town, which is only an hour from Mexico City, was described as the "City of Eternal Spring" by the naturalist-explorer Alexander von Humbolt (1769-1859). In Cuernavaca, Coronel reached a new phase in his career, and as he advanced into his late middle age, he increasingly turned to the effects of age and decline as his theme. He painted aging cardinals and popes, world-weary knights and decrepit, bearded moors, often depicted in profile. His figures were thin and emaciated, with the elongated, bony visages a Mannerist would love. Coronel's work of the 1980s and 1990s, took on a greater degree of exactness, a new precision and the draftsmanship that always under girded his figures became more apparent. The Coronel family has never been simply a family of artists but also a family of collectors, connoisseurs with a deep reverence and respect for the past. While many artists collect art, few do it with the obsessive passion of the Colonels, whose enthusiasm for gathering art and artifacts seemed to know no limits. The late Pedro Coronel collected Hispanic, pre-Colonial, Grecian, Roman and Medieval art as well as folk art from Mexico and tribal art from Africa. In 1985, the Museo Pedro Coronel was inaugurated in Zacatecas, in the historic Real Colegio y Seminario de San Luis Gonzada (the Royal College and Seminary of St. Louis Gonzaga), the Jesuit and then Dominican seminary that was founded in 1616. Rafael is no less a collector than his late brother and he accumulated a tremendous folk art collection and more than 5,000 of the masks that play such an important role in Mexican cultural life, and which appear in so many of his paintings. In 1990, he donated his collection to Zacatecas, the city of his youth, where the Museo Rafael Coronel was opened in 1990, joining the institution dedicated to the collection of his older brother. Situated in the former convent of San Francisco, it houses a collection of more than 16,000 objects, from pre-Columbian antiquities to the works of his father-in-law Diego Rivera, his own collection of masks and a selection of his drawings and paintings. Coronel's recent 2011-2012 retrospective "Retrofutura: Rafael Coronel" was accompanied by a massive, doorstop of a catalog, a literary and visual project that was produced and directed by his son, Juan Coronel Rivera. The catalog is no less than 600 pages, and it includes 355 full color reproductions of works that were done throughout the artist's long career. It replaces Rafael Coronel: Fifty Years of Painting, 1949-1999, as the definitive monograph on the artist. Another large retrospective was held a few months later in Monterrey. In recent years Coronel has turned to sculpture, exploring the same themes and subjects in bronze that he has with paint and canvas, Cardinals with masks, monkeys in Cardinal's cassocks, hermit, chickens and moors, some of which are handled in the same static manner as his paintings, while other's possess an animated quality. The rich, darkly patinated sculpture has the same mythic and melancholy quality of the rest of Coronel's work. Even though Coronel has entered his ninth decade, he is still painting enthusiastically. He says that "instead of talking about myself, I would rather paint." He does not work from models because he prefers that his works come from his prodigious imagination and his artistic memory. His recent work is still focused on figures - cardinals and artists, friars and old bearded men with their omnipresent masks – but they are depicted against more intense backgrounds, bright reds and blues, instead of the more somber palette of his earlier work. After sixty years of painting and a long, successful career, he has never forgotten his origins as an outsider and a northerner, saying that "If I see a cactus, I want to hug it." Rafael Coronel's work has been exhibited all over the world. His paintings were exhibited at the 8th Sao Paulo Biennale in Brasil (1965); the 1st Biennale in Tokyo and Osaka (1974); in a solo exhibtion at the Castello Sforzeco in Milano (1981); a solo exhibition at the Galerie der Wiener Staatsoper, Vienna (1981-1982); a solo exhibition at the Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten van Belgie (1985); a solo exhibition at the Petroleos Mexicanos Tower (Pemex), Mexico City (1991); a Retrospective in Monterrey, Mexico (1992); a Retospective at the B. Lewin Galleries, Palm Springs (1993); Retrofutura: Rafael Coronel, Museo Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico City (2011); and a retrospective in Monterrey, Mexico (2012).
Mexican, 1931 - 2019 Las Albertas Signed "Las Albertas" Rafael Coronel (ll) Acrylic on illustration board 30 1/8 x 40 inches (76.5 x 101.6cm) Provenance: B. Lewin Galleries, Beverly Hills, California (Framed 36 1/4 x 46 1/4 inches) Overall in good condition with no apparent issues.
Provenance: San Francisco, California area collector retired to the Florida Gulf Coast, name withheld. One of 15 lots from the collection of Pop Art, Abstract Expressionism etc. in this sale including two Lichtenstein, two Koons, two Hockney, Bacon, Dine, Arman, Coronel et al. Description: Rafael Coronel Large Painting Nina Payasa. Acrylic and pencil on paperboard, 28.375in x 38in sight, 40in x 51in x 1.5in framed, signed and titled in pencil or dark grey ink lower right, two California framing labels verso, matted and framed. SHIPPING and PICKUP: All lots in this sale are referred to our preferred UPS Store whose information appears in the item invoice. Note for lots 300 and above, jewelry, silver and coins, we have special flat rate provisions. Our recommended UPS Store offers a better grade of packing materials, ships for several area auction houses, ships internationally, offers freight services, can combine lots and importantly times their pickups with our appt. only St. Petersburg, Florida warehouse hours. Alternately, winning lots may be picked up by limited hours and days appts. at our St. Petersburg 33709 warehouse however be advised we do not have fixed loading dock hours and truckers must be in contact directly with our staff by cell phone. Previews are 1 person at a time for specific advance requested lots by appt. at our main St. Petersburg, FL warehouse the Saturday through Friday before the sale. Items are not staged for exhibition and are securely housed outside of preview times at multiple locations. The sale is online only with no in person auction audience or warehouse activity the day of sale or the Sunday after the sale. Winning bidders are invoiced Sunday and Monday and items are not available for pick up or shipping until payments are processed online and we are notified electronically, typically by Thursday, as there is no payment processing at our warehouse. Thank you for your interest and participation in another exciting Richard Stedman Estate Services LLC online event. Estate Ref: HPS
Rafael Coronel (Mexican, 1932-2019), Untitled, acrylic and charcoal on paperboard, signed lower right, sight: 29.75"h x 22.5"w, overall with frame: 37.75"h x 30.5"w
Artist: Rafael Coronel, Mexican (1931 - 2019) Title: Portrait IX from Galeria de Arte Misrachi Portfolio Year: 1978 Medium: Offset Lithograph, signed in the plate Edition: 2000 Size: 24.5 x 19 in. (62.23 x 48.26 cm)
Artist: Rafael Coronel, Mexican (1931 - 2019) Title: Galeria de Arte Misrachi Portfolio Year: 1978 Medium: 20 Offset Lithographs with Text in Portfolio Box and Cover sheet Edition: 2000 Size: 24.5 in. x 19 in. (62.23 cm x 48.26 cm)
Rafael Coronel (Mexican, 1932-2019), "Dos Viejos," 1960, oil on paper, signed and dated lower right, sheet: 19"h x 24.5"w, overall (with mat): 24.5"h x 30"w. Provenance: Purchased from Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1961
Rafael Coronel (Mexican, 1932-2019), "Retrato Sorprendido," oil on canvas, signed lower right, gallery label (Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, MI) affixed verso, canvas: 39.5"h x 14"w, overall (with frame): 41"h x 15.5"w. Provenance: Purchased from Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1965
Rafael Coronel (1932 - 2019): Woman in Brown acrylic on canvas; signed lower left, inscribed to verso "Angelo-Ellis Horvitz with best wishes and Affeccion [sic] / Rafael Coronel 1979", titled to printed and typewritten labels on stretcher
Rafael Coronel (MEXICAN, 1932 - 2019) color lithograph having an abstract design titled "La Madre Y El Hijo". Mounted in a silver painted wooden frame with mat behind glass screen. Paper measures approx. 25 1/4" height x 19 1/4" width to sight. Measures approx. 35 3/4" height x 30" width overall including frame. Appears in overall good condition. JD/B13/SH:3B
Rafael Coronel (MEXICAN, 1932 - 2019) oil painting on paper depicting an abstract scene titled "La Madre y El Nino" and signed to lower left. Mounted in a silver painted wooden frame with mat behind glass screen. Measures approx. 25 1/4" height x 19 1/4" width width to sight. Measures approx. 36" height x 29 7/8" width overall including frame. Appears in overall good condition. JD/B13/SH:3B
Artist: Rafael Coronel, Mexican (1931 - 2019) Title: Portrait XIV from Galeria de Arte Misrachi Portfolio Year: 1978 Medium: Offset Lithograph, signed in the plate Edition: 2000 Size: 24.5 x 19 in. (62.23 x 48.26 cm)
RAFAEL CORONEL (1932-2019) Marido y Mujer 1967 oil on Masonite, signed 'R CORONEL' lower left, numbered '240' on the reverse 15 7/8 x 21 3/4in (40.3 x 55.2cm)
RAFAEL CORONEL (1931 Zacatecas - 2019 Cuernavaca) Farbserigrafie auf Bütten, "El Poeta", unten links in Kreide signiert "RCoronel", Blindstempel, Ex. 56/100, mit Zertifikat, ca. 42x55cm (montiert), gerahmt (93,5x106cm)
Rafael Coronel (Mexican, 1932-2019), "Dos Viejos," 1960, oil on paper, signed and dated lower right, sheet: 19"h x 24.5"w, overall (with mat): 24.5"h x 30"w. Provenance: Purchased from Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1961
Rafael Coronel (Mexican, 1932-2019), "Retrato Sorprendido," oil on canvas, signed lower right, gallery label (Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, MI) affixed verso, canvas: 39.5"h x 14"w, overall (with frame): 41"h x 15.5"w. Provenance: Purchased from Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1965.
Rafael Coronel (Mexico, 1932 - 2019) "El Paletero" Oil on Canvas. Signed and dated ('73) lower left. Inscribed verso on canvas. Sight Size: 39.75 x 25.75 in. Overall Framed Size: 42.5 x 28.75 in.
Rafael Coronel (Mexican, 1932-2019), "Dos Viejos," 1960, oil on paper, signed and dated lower right, sheet: 19"h x 24.5"w, overall (with mat): 24.5"h x 30"w. Provenance: Purchased from Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1961
Rafael Coronel (Mexican, 1932-2019), "El Veterano," 1959, oil on paper, signed, titled, and dated lower left, gallery label (Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, MI) affixed verso, sight: 18.5"h x 24.5"w, overall (with frame): 24"h x 30"w. Provenance: Purchased from Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1960.
Rafael Coronel (Mexican, 1932-2019), "Retrato Sorprendido," oil on canvas, signed lower right, gallery label (Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, MI) affixed verso, canvas: 39.5"h x 14"w, overall (with frame): 41"h x 15.5"w. Provenance: Purchased from Forsythe Gallery, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1965.
Rafael Coronel (Mexicao, 1932 - 2019) "El Paletero" Oil on Canvas. Signed and dated ('73) lower left. Inscribed verso on canvas. Sight Size: 39.75 x 25.75 in. Overall Framed Size: 42.5 x 28.75 in.
Rafael Coronel Iluso; Espero (two works) graphite on paper 11 h x 8 w in (28 x 20 cm) Signed and titled to lower edge of each work 'Rafael Coronel Iluso' and 'Rafael Coronel Espero'. Provenance: Joel Mathieson Antiques & Fine Art, New York | Private Collection This work will ship from Lambertville, New Jersey.
RAFAEL CORONEL (Mexican, 1932-2019), ''Galeria de Arte Misrachi'' portfolio, complete set of (20) offset lithographs, signed in images, in clamshell box. Minor undulation, a few with half-moon handling creases. Sheets/images 24-3/4''h, 19''w; box 25-1/2''h, 19-3/4''w, 1-1/4''d.
