educationSeries: Dominican Cubism with Jaime Colson
Portrait of Jaime Colson (1901-1975), a Dominican painter trained in Spain and Paris, influenced by Cubism and regarded as one of Latin America's great twentieth-century painters.
Jaime Antonio Gumercindo Gonzalez Colson was born in Tubagua, Puerto Plata, in 1901. He studied in Santo Domingo, then went to Paris to improve his painting skills. In 1918, Jaime Colson settled in Spain, where he studied art at La Lonja in Barcelona and at the Academy of Fine Arts in Madrid. He lived in Paris from 1924 to 1934, where he was strongly influenced by the Cubists. An essentially figurative artist, Colson experimented with several different artistic styles, including Cubism, Surrealism and Neoclassicism.
He went to Mexico to work as a teacher, then returned to Barcelona. He later travelled to Santo Domingo, where he served as a professor of Fine Arts.
Colson worked in a number of fine styles, Cubist among them, in genres such as still lifes, nudes and mythological scenes, and this brought him international recognition. In Mallorca, Spain, he painted frescoes in an oratory, a major work of great artistic value. Through his contributions to Dominican art, Jaime Colson left a legacy that is now part of the best of the nation’s art. He is regarded as one of Latin America’s great painters of the twentieth century.
JAIME ANTONIO COLSON. Three children.
Two Heads’, Dominican Republic, 1957
Untitled (Mother and Child) oil on canvas 38 ½ x 27 in. (97.8 x 68.6 cm.)
“Still life”, 1943. Oil on canvas JAIME COLSON (Dominican Republic, Puerto Plata, 1901-Santo Domingo, 1975)
