Modern Painters

Carmen, right, with her husband,Jesse Loewenthal, and their friendJea n n ie R ol l i n , i n Pa r is. Her rera i mmersed hersel fin art and culture while in France, spending timewith the likes of Jean Genet and painter MarieRaymond. “She managed to get attention as ana r tist ,” notes cu rat or Mon ica E spi nel, the ed it or ofHerrera’s catalogue raisonné. “Versus New York,it was a very different climate for women artists.”88 MODERN PAINTERS JUNE/JULY 2016 BLOUINARTINFO.COMCARMEN HERRERA. OPPOSITE: CARMEN HERRERA AND LISSON GALLERY``````supporter, Jesse Loewenthal, an American, bysheer coincidence. Loewenthal knew Herrera’s olderbrother, an NBC staffer, in New York. For healthreasons, doctors had advised Loewenthal to travelto a warmer climate; when he decided on Cuba,the brother asked if he might hand-deliver a letterto his family. One meet-cute later and Herrera andLoewenthal were courting, dizzily in love; they latermarried in a low-key ceremony in Havana beforerelocating to New York, where Loewenthal taughtEnglish at Stuyvesant High School. Herrera’shusband—a multilingual stage actor with a serioussense of humor, according to independent curatorMonica Espinel—would serve as her decades-longKHOSPDWHFRQÀGDQWDQGVWUHWFKHUEXLOGHU+Hdied in 2000, at the age of 98.7KHWZROLYHGDWÀUVWRQ(DVWWK^ Street inManhattan, bouncing around several other downtownlocations in the years that followed. Herrera paintedDWKRPHHQUROOLQJEULHÁ\DWWKH$UW6WXGHQWV/HDJXHLQWKHRQO\SRLQWLQKHUFDUHHUZKHQshe had a dedicated studio in which to paint).“It was very funny—nothing but women,” the artistUHFDOOV ́7KHPHQZHUHÀJKWLQJVRPHZKHUHμ,QKHUKXVEDQGWRRNDVDEEDWLFDOIURPWHDFKLQJand by subsisting on a small pension from theCuban government, the couple was able to relocateto then dirt-cheap Paris for a few years.This was a fruitful and pivotal period duringwhich Herrera was exposed to a wide range ofpainting via exhibitions at theSalon des Réalités Nouvelles,shows in which she herself tookpart. “I had access to all theartists in Europe, really,” she recalls. And shesurrounded herself with a wild cast of characters,including Jean Genet and painter Marie Raymond:“Her son was doing crazy things,” Herrera says—that son being a certain Yves Klein. The paintingsHerrera was making in the early ’50s often haveDÁXLGHQHUJ\WRWKHP³FRQVLGHUWKHWRQGRIberic,ZLWKLWVRUDQJHUHGDQGEODFNVKDSHVseemingly wanting to bounce right off the canvas’scircular edge. Green GardenZKLOHIDLUO\minimalist, has an obvious organic inspiration, withits tangles of pared-down leaves.Eventually, Herrera and Loewenthal returnedto New York. “The money ran out,” Espinel explains.́,WZDVGLIÀFXOWIRUKHU³VKHZHQWIURPEHLQJaccepted and exhibited [in Paris] to being completelyostracized.” Still, it was in these years that theDUWLVWZRXOGÀQGKHUQLFKHLQDQJXODUJHRPHWULFabstraction, in which she typically combined nomore than two colors in spare compositions: a knife’sHGJHRIJUHHQLQWHUUXSWLQJDÀHOGRIZKLWH\HOORZsharply clashing with blue. She’s drawn to primarytones, and Herrera, who is Catholic, can’t recallever using purple—it’s a color for the pope and theVatican, she explains.Back in Manhattan, she found herself immersedonce again in a sea of boldfaced names—includingBarnett Newman, a friend and regular opera-goingFRPSDQLRQ+HUUHUDUHFDOOVZLWKDQHGJHRIdisdain, the tippling tendencies of the then ascendantAb-Ex crowd, including Willem de Kooning. “Youcan drink,” she sighs, “but you don’t have to be a pig!”)During this time, Herrera was making work andH[KLELWLQJVHPLUHJXODUO\LQFOXGLQJDVRORDW``````Noche Verde, 2014.Acrylic oncanvas, 72 x 60 in.19 4 9