José Ygnacio Bermúdez (1922-1998)

Born in Havana, Cuba in 1922, the artist was part of Los Once, a loose association of artists (1953-1963) which included Agustín Cárdenas, Hugo Consuegra, Guido Llinás, Zilia Sánchez, and Servando Cabrera Moreno among others. He studied under artist Roberto Diago in Havana and although he began his artistic practice as a graphic artist and designer, was also a painter, sculptor and photographer. During the 1950s he resided in Havana, New York, Washington D.C., and Phoenix. His work was acquired and shown in two exhibitions at The Museum of Modern Art, New York in 1957. He also continued to be included in solo and group exhibitions in Havana as well as throughout the US, Latin America, and the Caribbean in places such as Costa Rica, Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil and Jamaica. In 1961 The Washington Post art critic Leslie Judd Alexander remarked, “Bermúdez has moved from painting to collage, from collage to wood bas-reliefs, and from wood to metal. The process has been orderly and well-thought…so that his work now has extraordinary vigor and presence.”