With profound regret, the National Council of Visual Arts (CNAP) announced this Sunday the passing of Ever Fonseca, National Visual Arts Prize winner (2012), an essential figure of the Cuban artistic vanguard and an undisputed master to several generations of artists.

Fonseca joined the revolutionary struggle in the Sierra Maestra and subsequently served as an instructor for the Rebel Army. He also founded the National School of Visual Arts in Havana, holding the first enrolment record for its courses from 1962 to 1967, and taught at all three levels of visual arts education for over 20 years, states the CNAP notice.

He was the first Cuban painter of the 1960s invited to hold a solo exhibition at the National Museum of Fine Arts, inaugurated under the title Oils by Ever Fonseca, works that around 1970 became part of that institution’s permanent collection.

A member of the Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (UNEAC) and the International Association of Visual Artists (AIAP), he held dozens of solo exhibitions and over 400 group exhibitions in more than 25 countries, adds the source.

The Council of State of the Republic of Cuba awarded him the Distinction for National Culture and the Alejo Carpentier Medal; the Culture Workers’ Union conferred upon him the Raúl Gómez García Medal; and his work forms part of permanent and private collections in countries such as the United States, Switzerland, Lithuania, Poland, Germany, Yugoslavia, Colombia, Puerto Rico and Ecuador, among many others.

The released information concludes that both the CNAP and the Ministry of Culture accompany his family, friends and colleagues in this moment of grief, and that his legacy remains as spiritual heritage of the nation. Ever Fonseca will live forever in the strength of his art and in the mark he leaves on Cuban culture.

His ashes will be interred in Colón Cemetery in this capital, fulfilling his wish.