Juan Orlando Torres, master of the painters of Villa Clara, dies in Santa Clara

July 1, 2020

Culture and the plastic arts of Villa Clara are in mourning at the death of the prominent master painter Juan Orlando Torres Martínez (Caibarién, February 2, 1925–Santa Clara, June 20, 2020), which occurred on the night of Saturday, June 20.

Fate willed that the beloved mentor of creators bid farewell on the eve of Father's Day, when he himself was an example in the difficult "profession" of fatherhood, both for his students and the family he built. A man who educated and instilled in young people not only knowledge and technical elements, but ethical and human values.

"Our old Torres taught us to be as we are: demanding, restless, disciplined, hardworking… […] I will be grateful to him forever. He helped us grow very quickly" some of his disciples have expressed on social media.

Critic and curator Roberto Ávalos expressed: "He leaves us his work, the artists he trained over generations, and we will always remember his presence in our art."

Juan Orlando Torres Martínez graduated in drawing, painting, and sculpture from the San Alejandro school. He served as founder and director of the School of Plastic Arts of Las Villas Leopoldo Romañach, another great painter of whom he was a student.

For more than 40 years he dedicated himself to training generations of Villa Clara artists, alongside his academy colleagues Georgina Uriarte, Adela María Suárez, Rafael Alemán Ruiz, and Arnaldo Sarduy Guedes, who gave part of their lives to the school of plastic arts in the center of the island, founded on August 16, 1946.