The Lugubrious Traveler: Julio Ruelas, Mexican Modernist 1870 - 1907

by Carlos Monsiváis

Description

Julio Ruelas (1870-1907) was a painter of cadavers, hanged satyrs, bewitching maidens, sudden epiphanies and lovers' suicides. He was (and remains) the foremost Mexican Symbolist, close to Odilon Redon or Gustave Moreau in his appetite for hallucinatory scenarios. For Jos Clemente Orozco, as for many others, Ruelas was the touchstone influence, and he was an important participant in the burgeoning arts of his day: he was the principal illustrator for the Revista Moderna, a magazine not show more dissimilar to the Yellow Book that published excellent Spanish translations of Novalis, Edgar Allan Poe and Charles Baudelaire, as well as the poetry of Ruben Dar o. Based on the centenary exhibition of the same name at the National Art Museum in Mexico City, The Lugubrious Traveler restores Ruelas to his rightful prominence. Detailed and authoritative texts by three of Mexico's most respected critics--Teresa del Conde, Carlos Monsiv is and Antonio Saborit--explore the many facets of this curious artist, from his fauns, wraiths and succubae to his deeper and still disquieting trawling of the fin-de-si cle subconscious. show less

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Randy_Hierodule 153 reviews

This is a beautiful and informative introduction to an essential figure in Mexican culltural life at the turn of the last century (Julio Ruelas was an illustrator whose work decorated many of the texts and journals of the Latin American modernista writers). For anyone interested in Latin American literature and art or French decadence and its influence on Latin American modernism, this book is a treasure house. Many well-earned thanks to the Museo Nacional de Arte of Mexico!

Aug 31, 2008 (Edited)

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