Ignacio Asúnsolo (1890-1965) - Emiliano Zapata Brass Bust on Marble Base, C.1930

Ignacio Asúnsolo (1890-1965) was a Mexican sculptor born in Durango, Mexico. He started clay modelling at the age of 6, which was a medium his mother practiced. He started studying at the Scientific and Literary Institute of Chihuahua in 1904, then in 1908, he entered the National Institute of Fine Arts and Literature where he earned his first professorship. Asúnsolo participated in the Mexican Revolution through his artistic expression from 1913 to 1917. Then in 1919, he earned a scholarship that allowed him to travel to Europe to further his skills. He studied at the L'Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, France, where he met and married Mireille Marthe Barany. When he returned to Mexico, Secretary of Public Education Jose Vasconcelos invited Asúnsolo to be a part of his cultural project, where he created his first grand format sculptures at the Secretariat's central courtyard. By 1922, he had his sculpting professorship of the National Institute of Fine Arts and was assigned to making the Monumento a la Patria at the Pergolas Garden of the Chapultepec Castle. Then in 1949, he served as Director of the ENAP, now the Faculty of Arts and Design. He would also reunite with many Mexican sculptors like Francisco Marín, Luis Albarrán y Pliego, Federico Canessi and Ernest Tamariz, with the intent to form a society protecting Mexican sculptors without the interference of authentic foreign values that were introduced into Mexican culture by the works of Francisco Zúñiga and Rodrigo Arenas Betancourt. The Civil Association of Mexican Sculptors was formed, where Asúnsolo was appointed general secretary.

Marte Rodolfo Gómez,

Hilda Leal de Gómez,

Collection of Lance and Erika Aaron, San Antonio, Texas.

April 2007-January 2008 - Mexic-Arte Museum, Austin, Texas, "From Revolution to Renaissance, Mexican Art from the Aaron Collection."

November 2010-August 2012 - Museo Alameda Smithsonian, San Antonio, Texas, "Revolution & Renaissance, Mexico & San Antonio, 1910-2010."

2007 - Raquel Tibol, Ariel Zúñiga Laborde, "Ignacio Asúnsolo, 1890-1965", Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes, illus. p.25, fig. 6, 2013.

Formally trained in Mexico and France, Ignacio Asúnsolo is recognized as the most important sculptor of monuments constructed during the reconstruction of the nation following the 1910-1920 Mexican Revolution.