CCP will present exhibition as tribute to maestro Ramon Oviedo with selection by Fernando Báez Guerrero

CCP will present exhibition as tribute to maestro Ramon Oviedo with selection by Fernando Báez Guerrero
Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, 04/02/2014

Famed Dominican master painter Ramón Oviedo will receive a well-deserved national recognition with the presentation of a solo exhibition of his works that shows the evolution of his artistic creation in recent decades, both in painting and drawing.

The exhibition is titled “Tribute to Maestro Ramón Oviedo / Selected Works in the Fernando Báez Guerrero Collection”, curated and displayed by art critic and curator Abel Peralta Agüero. It will be showcased in the Main Exhibit Hall of the Perelló Cultural Center on April 3rd, 2014. The opening reception is scheduled for 6:00 pm.

The opening reception will be lead by the Perelló family, founders of the Perelló Cultural Center, and the Guerrero Báez family, collectors and owners of the works being displayed in the exhibition that will remain open for over a month and a half. The cultural activity will feature the renowned painter, and is expected to be enthusiastically supported by the authorities of Baní, who will be present during the ceremony.

Painter Ramón Oviedo, who was born in the Province of Barahona in 1924 and is approaching his 90th birthday, has dedicated his productive life to an intense artistic creation in the areas of advertising design, mapping, painting, and drawing. He has positioned himself among the most iconic personalities of national art, with a prestigious position and international recognition earned due to the quality of his art, and the strength and expression of humanistic and social content that characterize his aesthetic expressions.

His work “24 de abril” (April 24th), with which he won first prize in painting in the E. León Jimenes Art Contest in 1965, marked both the road map of the first phase of his style as well as the thematic platform that would bring him fame and prestige throughout the history of national art.

The exhibition comprises some 50 works in various formats, including paintings and drawings belonging to the private collection of businessman and collector Fernando Báez Guerrero, who on behalf of his family and in partnership with the Perelló Cultural Center in Bani, wanted to pay a significant national tribute to the artist with the presentation of a sample of his works. The main attraction of the exhibition is that it shows a representative share of the artistic production of maestro Oviedo, corresponding to the XXI century and part of the last decade of the XX century. The works almost entirely, either paintings or drawings, have not been exhibited publicly outside of Santo Domingo, so the public throughout the southern region of the country will have the opportunity to reconnect with the most recent work of the famous national painter, rediscovering his strong capacity for self-renewal, expertise, and daring technique, style, and creativity.

In a critical reflection on the artistic personality and work of Ramón Oviedo, writer and intellectual Ephraim Castillo has referred to “Those of us who have closely followed the aesthetic discourse of maestro Ramón Oviedo -especially those who have witnessed his great encounter with the history of art and, consequently, with his final foray into painting, holding it and clutching it as his most precious treasure- know what, even today, on the threshold of turning 90 years old, this famous Maestro (Maestro in capital letters) of plastic and graphic activity, has been able to achieve: not only a work composed of thousands of paintings and drawings on canvas, cardboard, and paper in various formats, which are part of the most qualified and prestigious public and private collections in many countries, but a set of murals that inhabit and transcend the boundaries of the Dominican Republic.  The artist has stayed active and has been able to create a monumental and historical work of 195 by 116 inches, such as the mural The Birth of the Constitution, which is on public display at the Palace of the National Congress, on the premises of the House of Representatives of the Dominican Republic.”

As other specialists indicate, in the selected works of Ramón Oviedo that the public will be able to enjoy at the Perelló Cultural Center, the art of an artist is recorded, a creator loaded with new feelings and emotions full of reflection and marked spiritual accents. Through his work, the artist, however, always emphasized the expression of a deep social sensitivity, the very theme of his art in general.

Among his paintings in acrylic on canvas, there is one work of art which, in the opinion of collector Fernando Guerrero Báez, is very unique among Dominican collectibles; a fabric whose only content is a large-scale signature, painted by the Maestro in black on white, and nothing else.

Throughout his successful career, Ramón Oviedo has presented his works in over a hundred exhibitions, both in the country and in galleries, museums, and cultural centers in the Dominican Republic, the rest of the Caribbean, Latin America, the United States, and Europe. He is the only Dominican whose work has been published and recognized by the Larousse Dictionary and the World Almanac. Additionally, one of his works is part of the Permanent Collection of the prestigious Galleria degli Uffizi, in the Palace of Florence, Italy.

His paintings are part of the most important public and private collections in the Dominican Republic, highlighting, among others, the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, of the Dominican Republic; the Central Bank; the House of Representatives of the National Congress; the E. León Jiménes Cultural Center; the Bellapart Museum; and, the Permanent Collection of the General Directorate of Customs.

Internationally, he set a historical precedent by being the only Maestro of Dominican painting whose country has witnessed two retrospective exhibitions presented in his honor at the Museum of Modern Art, the first one in 1977 and the second one in 1988.

His mural work is on permanent display at UNESCO headquarters in France, and at the Organization of American States (OAS) headquarters in Washington, DC. In the Dominican Republic, his murals have been installed at the Museum of Natural History; the Central Bank of the Dominican Republic; the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo; the Directorate General of Customs; the Supreme Court; and, Fundación Global Democracia y Desarrollo (FUNGLODE).

Oviedo, as a fitting recognition for his lifetime work, has been awarded the most important prizes, awards, and decorations presented by the Dominican State to a living artist and in creative process. It is important to highlight that, among other honors, he has received the Grand Prix d’Honneur at the National Biennial of Visual Arts in 1974, and has been recognized by Congress twice, first with the title of Illustrious Maestro of Dominican Painting, and subsequently, with the Medal of Merit for the Arts and Literature by the House of Representatives in 2010; and then with the Medal Order of Merit Duarte, Sánchez, and Mella from the Presidency of the Dominican Republic in 1997.  He received the Chevalier a l’orde des Arts et des Lettres award the same year, presented by the Ministry of Culture and Communication of the Government of France.