10 Facts About Mauricio Lasansky

The son of Eastern European Jews, Mauricio Lasansky was born on 12 October 1914 in Buenos Aires.

Mauricio Lasansky studied printmaking and engraving from his Polish father, who had made a living in those fields.

Mauricio Lasansky displayed early promise, showing favorably at the Mutulidad Fine Arts Exhibition with an honorable mention at 16 and a prize at 17 for sculpture.

Mauricio Lasansky entered the Superior School of Fine Arts in his hometown in 1933 and later met young Argentine Luis Barragan.

Three years later, Mauricio Lasansky began his career as director of the Free Fine Arts School in Villa Maria, Argentina.

Mauricio Lasansky relocated to New York City in 1943 on the first of five Guggenheim Fellowships and chose to remain in and become a citizen of the United States for political reasons in spite of a lack of financial resources and challenges with the English language.

Mauricio Lasansky wed in 1937, bringing his family with him to the United States at the time of his second Guggenheim Fellowship, in 1944.

Mauricio Lasansky dedicated his first several months in the United States to studying the extensive print collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, experimenting with modern art techniques in his own work at Atelier 17 in New York, absorbing techniques in intaglio and investigating particularly the work of Picasso, who was a major influence.

Mauricio Lasansky was an innovator in the creation of large metal-plate artwork, sometimes combining more than 50 plates to produce a single image.

The drawings, on regular paper with graphite pencil and watercolor washes meant to suggest blood, portrayed the victims and perpetrators of the atrocities of the Holocaust, but the bystanders, whom Mauricio Lasansky felt strongly bore a share of responsibility.