The outstanding plastic artist Juan Moreira lost the colors of life and began his journey towards Cuba's historical memory, when he passed away Tuesday in Havana at the age of 83.
Photo: Kariculture.

Havana, October 18 (RHC)-- The outstanding plastic artist Juan Moreira lost the colors of life and began his journey towards Cuba's historical memory, when he passed away on Tuesday in Havana at the age of 83.

The news of his death came like a bolt of lightning without warning, informed the Ministry of Culture, while echoing the words of praise spread by painter and critic Manuel Lopez Oliva.

Death doesn't respect even the most rooted creators; it has just taken away one of the Cuban artists who knew how to fulfill -with poetry and generational roots- the human and expressive mission that life assigned him, said Lopez Oliva.

Likewise, the creator highlighted Moreira's fidelity "to the Nation, his nobility of spirit, his values as a draftsman and painter, the paternal and family substance exercised, and the weight of a diverse imaginary".

In that sense, he highlights his prolific work that "went from his somewhat naturalistic sketches of the visions elaborated in the Isle of Youth, to a poetics that united his work in billboards with a very professional one," said Lopez Oliva.

His work as illustrator of editions of the text Don Quixote de la Mancha, his participation in the murals of the Habana Libre Hotel and the building where the Prensa Latina news agency was founded, his portraits of heroes and friends, as well as his erotic art stand out in his career.

A professor of drawing at the San Alejandro Professional School of Plastic Arts, Moreira recorded in his career some twenty personal exhibitions and dozens of group shows, while his pieces remain in prestigious collections in Cuba and the world.

He conceived ornamental and symbolic compositions for fountains and urban spaces, "and also made his home -together with his wife, fellow painter Alicia Leal- a friendly space for communication," said Lopez Oliva.

He was awarded the Distinction for National Culture, and now it is time to bid him farewell, but not before thanking him for his legacy, which exalted Cuban culture from the visual arts and was imprinted on his disciples.

Words by artist and art critic Manuel López Oliva

Death is no respecter of the real creators either. Death has just taken to the "kingdom of Cuban artistic memory" one of the Cuban artists who knew how to fulfill -with poetry and generational roots- the human and expressive mission that life assigned him.

Juan Moreira has passed away. Sadness envelops all of us who were his friends and knew of his fidelity to the Nation, his nobility of spirit, his values as a draftsman and painter, the paternal and family substance exercised, and the weight of a diverse imaginary that went from his somewhat naturalistic sketches of the visions elaborated in the Isle of Youth, to a poetics that joined his work in billboards with a very professional assimilation of the visual signs of the Customs House Rousseau through the New Figuration unleashed since the 60s.

He also produced a linear version of his own that illustrated our editions of Don Quixote de la Mancha, worked as Venturelli's assistant on the murals of the Habana Libre Hotel and the building where Prensa Latina was founded, made romantic portraits of heroes and friends accompanied by animals... and advanced toward a synthetic erotic art in design and purist in the careful chromatic planes of hard contours.

Moreira was a demanding professor of drawing in the Professional School of Plastic Arts "San Alejandro", conceived ornamental and symbolic compositions for fountains and spaces of the urban public existence, and also made of his house -together with his wife, also painter Alicia Leal- a friendly space for the communication of many Creole and external people of the art and other cultural spheres. The time will come for the just and necessary retrospective exhibition, to bring to light what he did and what has to be known by new generations, to gather his contributions in a book full of history and feelings.

Now it is our turn to bid him farewell with the gratitude of all the entities of the visual arts, of those who were his students, of the friends he always took into account, of those people of the homeland who admired his creations with pleasure and occasionally used them as a representative component of publications and environments.  His old workshop at Mercaderes 2 in Old Havana and his old house on 8th Street will forever keep the memory of his imprint... which indirectly remains in his daughters and wife. Let us remember him with his earned merits.