Gloria Calero Sierra
Gloria Calero Sierra was a Mexican artist and wife of artist Federico Cantú Garza, whose work was influenced by both Mexican Muralism and Surrealism movements. She is also a founding member of the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana.
Life
Calero was born in 1906 during the Porfirio Díaz regime, into a liberal and well-connected family, granddaughter of Justo Sierra and cousin of Javier Barros Sierra .[1][2] Her parents were Manuel Calero and Luz Sierra de Calero, who supported her artistic inclinations. Her family’s wealth and social status made it relatively easy to develop her talent early, educated in fine arts and culture, and learning to speak English fluently.[1]
She lost her hearing due to an illness as a child.[1]
She married a distant cousin, Chano Urueta, who was a film actor and director. With Cordelia Urueta, she frequented cafes and other places popular with artists and writers such as Renato Leduc, Xavier Villaurrutia and Luís Cardoza y Aragón. After friend Inés Amor opened her gallery in 1936, Calero met many other artists of the Mexican Muralism movement as well as those who were part of Surrealism such as poet Antonin Artaud and José Moreno Villa .[1]
In the early 1930s, Calero and Urueta decided to move to the Colonia del Valle neighborhood, to a small house on San Francisco Street. Her landlady and neighbor Luisa Garza, introduced Calero to painters and other friends of her son Federico Cantú Garza.[1] Cantú and Calero began an affair that ended her marriage after various confrontations. The two married on June 12, 1937, a second marriage for both.[1][2]
From 1938 to 1941, Calero and Cantú lived in New York City and later moved to San Miguel de Allende, splitting their time between Mexico and the United States.[1] They were considered inseparable, and her image appeared in Cantú’s work such as the Los Altares sculpture at the Secretaría de Comunicaciones y Transportes .[2] After Cantú’s death in 1989, Calero fell into depression and months later had a clot which required amputation of a limb. Calero died in 1990.[1]
Art
Caler began her art career when she was thirty years old, with her major influences being the artists of the Mexican Muralism and Surrealism movements in Mexico. She stated that one of her biggest influences was the work of Jesús Guerrero Galván.[1]
Calero was a founding member of the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana, which afforded her some of the first exhibitions of her work.[1]
Her work can be found in collections such as those of MacKinley Helm, Ali Chumacero, Licio Lagos, Bernard Lewin and the Cantú family.[1]
References
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