(b Mexico City, 29 Aug 1892; d Mexico City, 4 April 1985). Mexican
painter and draughtsman. He studied at the Academia de San Carlos in
Mexico City from 1910. In 1917 he was employed as a draughtsman by
the Ministry of Agriculture and began to attend the Escuela de
Pintura al Aire Libre de Santa Anita under Alfredo Ramos Martínez,
his palette gradually lightening. In 1920 he was appointed assistant
draughtsman in the Ministry of Education and then tutor at the
Academia de San Carlos. In 1922 he was commissioned by the Ministry
of Education to paint a mural, the Landing of the Cross (fresco, 7*8
m; Mexico City, Escuela N. Prep.), an allegorical depiction of the
implantation of Catholicism in New Spain in the 16th century, with
large classical figures set in a steeply inclined composition. Over
the next 40 years, Alva de la Canal painted six public murals with
allegorical and historical themes, such as the Life of Morelos
(encaustic and fresco, 1937; Janitzio, nr Pátzcuaro). This is a
sculptural monument to Morelos, into which the painting is inserted,
and which depicts scenes from the life of the Independence figure
arranged in an ascending spiral form around the interior of the
monument.
El Café de nadie
Landing of the Cross
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