Nicolas de Jesus is a talented and successful
Mexican artist, he paints and also produces his etchings on papel amates (amate bark paper, ficus cotinifolia &c., a traditional product of trees local to the San Pablito, Puebla region, State of Puebla).
Nicholas was born 1960 in the community of Alto Balsas in the indigenous Nahua region of Guerrero,
Mexico. He is the son of the Mexican Amate artist, Pablo de Jesus. He has also maintained a studio
in Chicago, Illinois where he had lived, 1989-1994. He has successfully exhibited in various cultural centers in Chicago, as well as other parts of the United States, Mexico, France, England, Japan and Holland. Nicolas de Jesus is well known for his works on
The extremes of social inequality which he and his family experienced in their native village of Amayaltepec, located in the arid province of Guerrero, Mexico, continue to inform and pervade his work. Nicolas says that he is "an engraver, a defender of
the rights of indigenous peoples and anti-clerical."
Source. La Llorona Gallery, Chicago, IL, Webpage
The Art of Nicolas de Jesus
 La Esperanza, The Hope (small photographed image)
... La Esperanza, The Hope (large photographed image)
El Funeral del P.R.I., The Funeral of the P.R.I. (scanned image)
... P.R.I., Institutional Revolutionary Party
Disfraces, Masks (scanned image)
Politicos, Politicians (scanned image)
Despierte America, Wake Up America (photographed image)
Buitres, Vultures (photographed image)
La Llegada, The Arrival (scanned image)
Fiesta de los Muertos, Fiesta of the Dead
(photographed image)
... Fiesta de los Muertos, Fiesta of the Dead
(larger image)
Death and Mexican Culture
Mexican Folkart Skeleton | |
Nicolas de Jesus often uses the celebration Day of the Dead (Dia de los Muertos) as a subject of his art. The portrayed skeletons are visual representations of the souls of the departed. The themes of his work include Mexican rural life as well as Mexican and world politics and events.
Look closely at his work and you might see the influences of Mexican engraver, illustrator and artist José Guadalupe Posada (1852-1913) but beyond that, the spirits of ancestors of the indigenous Mexican people. You will also see possibly politically subversive and subjective elements in his work.
Death also lacks meaning for the modern Mexican. It is no longer a transition, an access to another life more alive than our own. But although we do not view death as a transcendence, we have not eliminated it from our daily lives. The word 'death' is not pronounced in New York, in Paris, in London, because it burns the lips. The Mexican, on the contrary, has a familiarity with death, he laughs at it, caresses it; it is one of his favorite toys and his most constant love. True, there is perhaps as much fear in his attitude as in that of others, but at least death is not hidden away: he looks at it face to face, with impatience, distain or irony. "If they are going to kill me tommorow, let them kill me right away."
Source. Paz, Octavio,The Labyrinth of Solitude.
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