Mari Carmen Hernández’s portrait was the theme of her exhibition at Masp in 1966, and resulted in the generous gift that is reproduced in this catalogue. Lorquin identified its essence as a “new funereal art form” belonging to “an immemorial past and above all, to a vision of the hereafter”. It effectively refers to an approximation of the portrait in which absolute frontality, hypertrophy and an emphasis on the ocular cavities’ centrality, and above all the archaism resulting from the fixed formal stare, truly suggest some analogy to the transcendental portrait of the Lower Empire, not rarely also characterized by the greater proximity of the portrait to its support plane. A freshness of expression and humor and a superabundance of psychic life, solidly anchor these portraits but within the modern portraiture tradition. At times, not removed from the memory of expressionism, Mari Carmen Hernández‘s portraiture, on the other hand, seems to be too musical and happy for it seriously to attempt disfigurement.

— Unknown authorship, 1998

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