Painter Cosme Proenza Dies in Holguín

September 12, 2022

In the early morning hours of this Monday, September 12, painter, draftsman, engraver, illustrator, and muralist Cosme Proenza Almaguer died in the city of Holguín. He was 74 years old and was possibly the most important figure in the plastic arts in the eastern part of the Island.

According to a message from his daughter Sandra Proenza on Facebook, the death occurred "after several days fighting for his life in our city's hospital, he had covid, his ashes will be taken to his native land with his parents."

The Provincial Council of the Performing Arts of that eastern province recalled that he was "one of the most recognized Cuban artists, pride of Holguín, from where he created a universal work."

Born in 1948, in Tacajó, Báguanos, Holguín, Proenza possessed a distinctive worldview, distinguishable in the contemporary artistic sphere and based on the research and reappropriation of the classics of universal art.

A graduate of the National School of Art in Havana and the Institute of Fine Arts in Kiev, Ukraine, Proenza created series such as "Manipulations," "Boscomaniacs," "The Gods Listen," "Woman with a Hat," and "Variations on Matisse Themes."

In his pieces, created in the city where he stubbornly remained until the end of his days, the symbolic and the mythical accompany the human being in an artistic via crucis, with evident influences that the codes of European art left on him.

Among his works are remembered pieces such as "Cecilia Valdés," "Lennon and the Night," "Garden," "The Expulsion from Paradise," and "San Cristóbal de La Habana."

In 2016, Cosme opened the Park of Times in Holguín, a project featuring his pictorial creations, converted into sculptures, recalls the Provincial Direction of Culture of Holguín.

Proenza's pieces were included in multiple group exhibitions, and were made available to the public several times in the main art galleries of his city.

Among the awards with which he was recognized are the Distinction for National Culture, the Axe of Holguín, and the Alejo Carpentier Medal. He was nominated several times for the National Prize for Plastic Arts.

Institutions and artists have mourned this death. Holguín and Cuban culture are in mourning once again.