Miguel Avataneo was born in the province of Cordoba in Argentina and his love of the pure form of classicism was nourished by his early interest in the Italian masters: Corregio, Giorgione 1478-1510, Raphael 1483-1520 and Titian 1488/90-1576. He was also greatly influenced by the late eighteenth century french paintings of David, Gustave Courbet 1819-1877 and Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres 1780-1867. Recognizing the influences implicit in his training, but striving to build upon the discipline it gave him, he has created a world of pictorial imagery entirely his own. The unusual intensity of his art takes him far beyond the borders of South America and places him in a broader international artistic community. In 1988, he graduated from La Escuela de artes de la Universidad Nacional de Cordoba. He has had many successful individual exhibitions since 1988 and has obtained distinctions too numerous to list. His elegant and thought provoking studies are instantly recognizable with collectors. At first viewing of Avataneo's artwork, we catch our breath at images so little anticipated. His paintings are so rich, yet so serene, and so forceful, yet so tender. His figures have a stately passivity and appear suspended between day and night. He is able to give to his dreams the status of reality.
