Camilo Mori was a painter, poster artist, and theatre designer, and one of the most prolific and multifaceted avant- garde artists in Chile. The Traveller (1928) is the result of his first experiments with European trends, especially those that emerged after Cézanne. It is a portrait of his wife, the painter Maruja Vargas Rosas, whose work is barely referenced, being recognised more as the painter’s muse than as an autonomous artist. The portrait, made in Valparaíso, represents a passenger on a train in the heyday of rail travel in Chile. The train also became a place of appropriation for women, allowing them to move freely from one place to another in the midst of the struggle for women’s voting rights. Maruja Vargas also carries a book, an indication of women’s access to the cultural sphere. The artist, a member of the Communist Party and director of the National Museum of Fine Arts, was awarded the National Art Prize in 1950 and remains an emblematic figure in Chilean art history. The Traveller is Mori’s best-known work, and has been widely reproduced on postage stamps, schoolbooks, and calendars.
This is the first time the work of Camilo Mori is presented at Biennale Arte.
—Gloria Cortés Aliaga
