Nefero

Nefero (1920 – August 19, 2005) was a Mexican painter and founding member of the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana. He was part of the Mexican muralism movement, whose work was particularly influenced by Manuel Rodríguez Lozano.

Nefero was born Ignacio Nieves Beltrán in Tampico, Tamaulipas. He went to study painting at the Academy of San Carlos, meeting Manuel Rodríguez Lozano, who was director of the school at the time and suggested his artistic name, which means “beautiful” in ancient Egyptian.

Friend and disciple of Rodríguez Lozano, he was invited to collaborate on a mural called Piedad en el desierto (Mercy in the desert) when Rodríguez Lozano was incarcerated at Lecumberri. The work was later moved to the Palacio de Bellas Artes.

In 1951 the Instituto Francés de América Latina awarded him a grant to study at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris. There he had an individual exhibition at the Galerie Artiel, and he traveled Europe the following year, visiting Spain, Belgium, Holland, Austria, Italy, Yugoslavia and Greece.

Nefero died at age 85.

Nefero’s relationship with Rodríguez Lozano led to his first individual exhibition at the Galería Gama owned by María Asúnsolo in 1943. His other individual shows include the Salón de la Plástica Mexciana (1953), the Instituto Francés para América Latina (1958), the inauguration of the Museo de Arte Moderno and Museo de la Ciudad de México in 1958 and the Centro Deportivo Israelita (1960), along with several exhibitions at the gallery of the Excélsior newspaper and the Universidad Feminina in Veracruz.

His work was also shown in collective exhibitions in Mexico, France, Peru, Colombia, Cuba, Sweden and Israel, mostly in the 1940s and 1950s. His important collective shows in Mexico included those at the Galería Benjamin Franklin, the workshop of Rodríguez Lozano and the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana.

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