MoCAArt will be the home of the Mark & Kathryn Ford Collection. Curated by Mark Ford and Suzanne Snider, the collection is in two parts: Modernist and Contemporary Central American masters. The acquisitions commenced in 2008 and continue as important works are available.

Elmar Rojas, considered by some critics to be the most representative artist of his country, expressed his conflicting feelings about his homeland throughout his long career.

Rojas was born in central Guatemala in 1938 and had an unusually broad education. Though he was primarily interested in art and architecture, he studied many other subjects, including literature, philosophy, and political and social science.

He studied at the Escuela Nacional de Artes Plásticas from 1957 to 1962. In 1960, he also enrolled in night classes at the Universidad de San Carlos to study architecture. That same year, he had his first show at the Salón de Exposiciones de la Facultad de Arquitectura. 

In 1963, Rojas left for Europe. He studied Italian language and culture at the Università per Stranieri di Perugia and took classes at the Accademia di Belle Arti “Pietro Vannucci.” After six months, he went to Paris to study at the École de Beaux-Arts in Montmartre. He also studied at the Universidad Complutense in Madrid.

In 1972, Rojas began to move away from the social commentary that had been the basis of his previous work. His paintings became more colorful and hopeful. Using a variety of media, including oils, acrylics, watercolor, sandstone, gold, and silver, he constructed elaborate, whimsical, dreamlike compositions. De Ávila described this as an experimental phase of “abstract solutions and metallic fields… [with] pre-Hispanic reminiscences.”  

 Beginning in the 1980s, the image of the espantapájaro – a dark, mysterious figure from Maya folklore – has dominated his work.

In the words of art historian Dr. Edward J. Sullivan: “We must above all look at these paintings by Rojas for their originality and freshness. They are images with a highly evocative power. They speak with a strong and clear voice to all of us and have an intimate message for each observer who looks at them with care.”

Rojas’s contributions to the advancement of the arts in Guatemala go far beyond his painting. He was a well-regarded architect and teacher. He was one of the few artists in the 1960s to use his work to draw attention to the violence in his country and the marginalization of its indigenous people – and his influence as a founder of Grupo Vértebra cannot be underestimated. He also founded the country’s Ministry of Culture in 1986 and served as its first minister.

Elmar Rojas died in 2018 at the age of eighty.

Awards and Honors for Elmar Rojas

1959 – won the Primer Premio Centroamericano de Pintura en el Certamen Permanente Centroamericano “15 de septiembre,” Guatemala City, Guatemala

1964 – won the Premio Centroamericano de Pintura at the Certamen de Cultura, San Salvador, El Salvador

1970 – awarded the Premio Latinoamericano by the Casa de Cultura Ecuatoriana in Quito, Ecuador

1983 – won the Premio Único at the Bienal Mesoamericana at the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo (MAC), Panama City, Panama

1984 – presented with the Gran Premio Iberoamericano “Cristóbal Colón” by King Juan Carlos de Borbón, Madrid, Spain

1989 – won the Premio Internacional “Camilo Mori” at the IX Bienal de Arte, Valparaíso, Chile

1991 – named one of the fifteen best artists in the world by the Mid-America Arts Alliance (MAAA)

CENTRAL AMERICAN MODERNIST ART

from the collection of the Museum of Central American Art

Cornell Art Museum at Old School Square
51 North Swinton Avenue
Delray Beach, Florida