Last Updated: 12:01amBST01/07/2006
Luis Jimenez, who died on June 13 aged 65, was known for moulding huge and garishly-coloured fibreglass sculptures celebrating Hispanic, cowboy and Indian and working class culture; he was killed when a piece on which he was working, a sculpture of a giant mustang horse, destined for Denver International Airport, fell on top of him.
Jimenez believed that "an artist's job is to constantly test the boundaries" and though his sculptures, drawing on the colourful social realism of Mexican murals of the early 20th century, may not have pushed the boundaries of art, they sometimes tested the boundaries of good taste.
In America, though, Jimenez was extremely successful, winning many awards and creating massive fiberglass neon-coloured spray-painted sculptures for some of the country's leading museums and public places.
Perhaps his best-known piece, Man on Fire (1979), now in the Smithsonian National Museum of American Art, was inspired by Buddhist monks in South Vietnam who burned themselves to death and the Aztec emperor Cuauhtemoc, who was held over flames by the Spanish conquistadors in an attempt to force him to reveal the whereabouts of his gold.
Another sculpture, Vaquero, depicting a cowboy riding an electric blue bucking bronco, sits outside the museum.
James Moore, a former director of the Albuquerque Museum in Jimenez's adopted state of New Mexico, was in no doubt of his artistic standing: "If there were a Michelangelo living in our time in terms of talent and creativity," he opined recently, "Luis was it."
Others were less enthusiastic. In 1983, when a sculpture of a Native American comforting a dying woman was unveiled in the OldTown district of Albuquerque, some residents objected, saying that it looked as if the woman was being raped.
Another piece, Fiesta Jarabe, featuring a man and a woman dancing the Mexican hat dance, was attacked by feminists who complained that the woman was too wanton, and by Latino men who said that the man looked too paunchy.
When a huge statue of a steelworker was exhibited at the Three Rivers Arts Festival in Pittsburgh in 1990, a bitter controversy arose over its name, Hunky - Steel Worker. Apart from connotations of sexual attractiveness, in north American slang "hunky" is a term of abuse for unskilled labourers from eastern Europe.
The word had quickly to be ground off the base of the statue to save it from being flung into the river, as had been threatened by a United Steel Workers union spokesman if the situation was not resolved.
Luis Jimenez was born in El Paso, Texas, on July 30 1940. His father, an illegal immigrant from Mexico, owned an electric sign shop, where young Luis learned to spray paint and weld.
He graduated in fine arts from the University of Texas and lived in New York for a time in the 1960s before moving to New Mexico where he began his career making huge outdoor sculptures.
Jimenez is survived by his wife and by two sons and two daughters.
Missing this year was a public artwork, a good decision considering that the festival's footprint was evolving and that there also wasn't time to negotiate a quality work. Such pieces seem to do best when they're in the park; when they're large enough to command attention within the vastness of a cityscape; and when they're controversial (intentionally or not), like the "Hunky Steel Worker" (1990), or whimsical, like the sticks habitat "Bivouac" (2003). If such pieces are commissioned, arranging for them to stay through the summer could help to justify the generally pricey investment.
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Places: Late sculptor's 'Hunky' was basis for debate
Wednesday, June 21, 2006
By Pat Lowry, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
The death of sculptor Luiz Jimenez last week following an accident in his New Mexico studio was a tragic ending for a man whose boldly colored, provocative, larger-than-life public sculptures stand as a testament to his willingness to make waves in the art world and beyond.
/ Post-GazetteLuis Jimenez's sculpture that was on loan for the 1990 Three Rivers Arts Festival stirred controversy with its name, "Hunky -- Steel Worker."
Click photo for larger image.
In the 1960s and '70s, when most American male artists were making content-free or ambiguous work, Jimenez tapped a different aesthetic and political tradition: the social realism of Mexican murals of the early 20th century. That influence, combined with metal-working and spray-painting skills learned in his father's El Paso, Texas, sign shop, led him to create fiberglass sculptures that celebrated Hispanic, American Indian and working-class culture, Western pioneers, firefighters (long before 9/11), horses, alligators and, you may recall if you were in Pittsburgh in 1990, the "Hunky -- Steel Worker," exhibited that year in the Three Rivers Arts Festival.
The steelworker was big and buff, but that wasn't the kind of hunky Jimenez was channeling. He meant no offense, believing "hunky" was a term of admiration and respect used among steelworkers. Pittsburgh erupted. Press conferences were called, ethnic outrage was expressed, letters to the editor were written. Soon the word was ground off the base of the sculpture, saving the steelworker formerly known as Hunky from being floated down the river, a scenario predicted by a United Steel Workers' union spokesman if the situation wasn't resolved.
Jimenez's sculpture was just doing its job, sparking dialogue about language, ethnicity and the proper way to honor steelworkers as it stirred up a big batch of brouhaha. Originally commissioned by Buffalo's Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority, "Steel Worker" now lives a more tranquil life on the University of Massachusetts campus in Boston, the Buffalo deal having fallen through. He was just visiting here in 1990, but Pittsburgh should never have let him go.
Historic Review adieu
DENVER (AP) - A 32-foot sculpture commissioned three years before DenverInternationalAirport opened was finally installed Monday in the median of Pena Boulevard leading up to the terminal.
"Mustang" was bolted onto a concrete base and the plastic and duct tape was removed on Tuesday.
Creation of the sculpture survived lawsuits over the pace of the work, the illness of sculptor Luis Jimenez, and his death when a section of the sculpture came loose from a hoist and pinned him against a steel support beam.
Jimenez was 65 when he died at his Hondo, N.M., studio in June 2006. His family, including sons Adan and Orion, finished the sculpture, his widow Susan Jimenez said.
"The sculpture he pretty much had completed... he stated that the head was finished," Jimenez said. "The torso and the hind quarters had been modeled in fiberglass. It was all ready to go."
Adan and Orion Jimenez were 8 and 10 years old, respectively, when they began helping their father work on the sculpture commissioned in 1992. The brothers, now 20 and 21, prepped the fiberglass. Richard Lobato, of Roswell, N.M., who earned a reputation for painting low rider cars, and owner of Lobato Racing, and another painter named Camillo Nunez painted the sculpture using color formulas written by Jimenez before he died.
"I cannot tell you happy we are," Susan Jimenez said. "I don't think you can even put into words, what it represented to Luis and how much he put into it and how it took on it's own personality."
The sculpture was built in three pieces - head, torso and legs. A custom-fabrication shop north of San Francisco built the frame that allows the 6 ton piece to stand on its own.
Jimenez, a world-renowned artist learned to paint and to fashion large works out of metal in his father's sign shop in El Paso, Texas. He graduated in fine arts from the University of Texas in Austin and lived in New York City for a time.
His 1969 work, "Man on Fire" depicted a man in flames that he said drew its inspiration both from Buddhist monks in South Vietnam who burned themselves and the Mexican story of Cuahtemoc, set afire by Spanish conquerors. The sculpture was displayed at the Smithsonian.
Jimenez won numerous awards and his work is on display at public sites across the nation and in New Mexico, including the University of New Mexico and Albuquerque's Martineztown.
"Mustang" held a personal connection for Jimenez, who as a child asked his parents for a horse and was instead given a stick horse. He partly modeled the sculpture on a horse he eventually bought, an Apaloosa named Blackjack.
"That horse and him or that spirit is so imbued in this piece. That would probably be a monument to his spirit, his primitive animalness... He was an unusual person, in a good way."
She also said it's a monument to the West and how the arrival of horses helped bring civilization to the region by allowing people to travel long distances.
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