Umberto Peña

UMBERTO PEÑA (Havana, Cuba, 1937- Spain, 2023)
"Burnt in the fire of her own day".
Etching on paper. Copy 3/8.
Signed, dated and titled in pencil in the lower area.
Size: 38 x 54,5 cm; 55 x 70 cm (frame).

Provenance: Manuel Reguera Saumell collection, recognised as one of the great Cuban writers and playwrights of the 20th century. As the set of photographs accompanying this collection testify, Reguera forged close friendships with the leading exponents of Cuban art during the years he spent in his native country. It was then that Reguera, backed by the bond that united him with Amelia Peláez, Rene Portocarrero, Carlos Abela and Antonia Eiriz, began his facet as a collector, giving birth to what would become his personal collection.

Umberto Peña was born in Havana, Cuba, in 1937 and studied at the Academia San Alejandro from 1954 to 1958. In 1959 he began to exhibit his work publicly, at the Salón Nacional de Cuba and at the Centro de Arte Contemporáneo in Mexico. In July 1964 he held his first personal exhibition at the Asociación de Grabadores de Cuba, entitled 12 Litografías (12 Lithographs), an exhibition which later travelled to Prague. During these years, Peña's international recognition grew and his works were shown in England, Canada, Italy, Japan, Sweden, Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, Russia and Poland. In 1964 he received his first major recognition, the Lithography Prize at the Havana Exhibition, and in 1967 he was selected as one of the young painters to represent Cuba at the V Biennale de la Jeune Peinture in France. In 1992, the artist left Cuba for Mexico and then moved to the United States, where he lived for more than a decade before moving to Spain. The artist has had more than a dozen solo exhibitions in America and Europe.