Acrylic and oil on canvas on Masonite, 1966. 612x501 mm; 24⅛x19¾ inches.
Provenance: Gifted by the artist to private collection, Chile and Israel, 1960s; thence by descent to current owner, private collection, Israel.
Exhibited: Salón de la Plástica Mexicana, Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes, with the label.
Published: Enrique F. Gual, La Pintura de Fanny Rabel, 1968, page 30 (illustrated).
Rabel (1922-2008) is considered the first modern female muralist in Mexico, but also worked in variety of other media including painting, engraving, drawing and ceramic sculpture. Born in Poland, her family moved to Paris in 1929 before settling in Mexico in 1936. She initially studied drawing and engraving at the Escuela Nocturna para Trabajadores, then continued her training at the Escuela Nacional de Pintura, Escultura, y Grabado, Mexico City, in 1942.
She was one of four students, nicknamed "Los Fridos," who studied under Frida Kahlo at her home in Mexico City, known as the Casa Azul. Rabel apprenticed with the important Mexican muralists Diego Rivera (1886-1957) and David A. Siqueiros (1896-1974), and completed numerous murals herself, including her most significant work La Ronda en el Tiempo, 1964 , located in the Museo Nacional de Antropología, Mexico City. During the mid-20th century, Rabel's style shows the influence of Kahlo's surrealist and magic realist tendencies, revealed in the dreamlike scene of the current oil painting, which shows three heads surrounded by concentric shapes resembling stonework.
