Cedeño, Juan Manuel (1914–1997)

Juan Manuel Cedeño (b. 28 December 1914, d. 11 August 1997), Panamanian painter. Cedeño studied under Humberto Ivaldi and Roberto Lewis at the Escuela Nacional de Pintura in Panama and at the Chicago Art Institute (B.F.A., 1948). In addition he was invited to study at the Polytechnical Institute of Mexico where he worked with artists Sigueiros and Diego Rivera. His role as an educator is one of his greatest contributions to Panama. He was director of his alma mater, in 1952 renamed the Escuela Nacional de Artes Plásticas (1948–1967) and professor at the University of Panama (1967–1978). His prolific paintings earned him the title of "Graphic Chronicler of the Panamanian Nationality," although he preferred to be called the "painter from Los Santos."

In his work with local folklore themes, Cedeño was one of the first Panamanian artists to experiment with the geometrization of forms derived from cubism and futurism, as in Domingo de Ramos (1955). Although he also paints landscapes and still lifes, he is best known for his many commissioned portraits, for example, Octavio Méndez Pereira (1950) and in 1995 he was contracted to complete series depicting significant events of Panama's history for the Foreign Minister, Gabriel Lewis Galindo.

See alsoArt: The Twentieth Century .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Mónica Kupfer, ed., Exposición Retrospectiva de la obra de Juan Manuel Cedeño (1983).

P. Padros, Exposición Maestros-Maestros (1987).

Additional Bibliography

Cedeño, Juan Manuel, and Monica Kupfer. Exposición retrospectiva de la obra de Juan Manuel Cedeno. Panamá: Museo de Arte Contemporaneo, 1983.

                               Monica E. Kupfer