Fernando Leal (artist)

Fernando Leal (February 26, 1896 - October 7, 1964) was one of the first painters to participate in the Mexican muralism movement starting in the 1920s. After seeing one of his paintings, Secretary of Education José Vasconcelos invited Leal to paint at the Escuela Nacional Preparatoria. The resulting work is Los danzantes de Chalma. Leal also painted a mural dedicated to Simón Bolívar at the Anfiteatro Bolivar, as well as religious murals such as those at the chapel dedicated to the Virgin of Guadalupe at the Basilica Villa in Tepeyac.

Fernando Leal was born in Mexico City on February 26, 1896. He first studied art at the Academy of San Carlos, then switched to the Escuela al Aire Libre de Coyoacán, studying under Alfredo Ramos Martinez. He was classmates with Gabriel Fernández Ledesma, Rafael Vera de Córdoba, Ramón Alva de la Canal and Fermín Revueltas.

Leal died on October 7, 1964. He is survived by his son, Fernando Leal Audirac, who also became a noted Mexican painter.

Leal was one of the first muralists in Mexico, in a movement that began in the 1920s. In 1921 Vasconcelos, Secretary of Education, visited Leal’s school in Coyoacán. An easel painting by the artist called Zapatistas at Rest, painted that same year, caught his eye. Leal said that the imagery of the indigenous persons with realistic detail, done in European painting techniques, fit Vasconcelos’ needs. He asked Leal to do a mural on the walls of the preparatory school. Leal was recruited by Vasconcelos along with a number of other artists such as Diego Rivera, Xavier Guerrero, Amado de la Cueva, Jean Charlot, David Alfaro Siqueiros and others to paint for the post-Revolutionary government, to create a “new sense of Mexican identity.”

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