Mexico City — One of Mexico's most treasured artistic legacies, 39 paintings by the Surrealist artist Remedios Varo now in this city's Museum of Modern Art, is in legal limbo amid a nasty battle over ownership of the works.
Although Varo's works are rare and almost never sold at auction, she is esteemed by art historians and sought after by collectors as a key female Surrealist. Her paintings have sold at auction for more than $800,000, ranking her behind only Frida Kahlo on the list of priciest female Latin America artists.
Influenced by Rene Magritte, Giorgio de Chirico and Max Ernst, Varo's unique style has earned her a cult following in the United States, Japan and Europe. Public appreciation is limited because of the small number of her known paintings -- about 150 -- and her scant presence in galleries.
She was born in Spain in 1908, emigrated to Mexico during World War II and lived out her days here until dying of a heart attack in 1963. She began her career in Paris in the late 1930s and was among the circle of Surrealist artists influenced and encouraged by Andre Breton.
The dispute centers on who owns 39 paintings first lent and then given to Mexico City's Museum of Modern Art in 1999 by Walter Gruen, an Austrian and also a World War II refugee who was Varo's supporter and lover the last 11 years of the artist's life.
Varo's niece Beatriz Varo Jimenez of Valencia, Spain, has contended in a Mexico City family court that she is Varo's rightful heir and that Gruen had no right to give the works to the museum. The niece won a crucial judicial round in March. But Mexico's National Institute of Fine Arts is claiming that the works are state patrimony and is appealing the verdict.
Gruen, now 91, said in an interview that he inherited no works from Varo, who died intestate. He said that he and his wife, Alexandra, whom he married in 1965, acquired all the paintings given to the museum on the open market after Varo's death and so are his to give. He said he gave the only painting in Varo's studio at the time of her death, "Still Life Reviving," to the artist's mother. The work was auctioned at Sotheby's New York in 1994 for $574,000.
Varo Jimenez's attorney, Gustavo Ortiz Madrigal, contended in an interview that all the paintings were in the artist's studio when she fell mortally ill, and so they belong to her niece. Varo Jimenez has been able to score legally, say sources close to the case, because the Gruens' documentation of their acquisitions is spotty. "Walter Gruen donated the paintings in a fraudulent manner," said the Mexico City lawyer. "He has never proved he was the owner. He has no receipts or contracts, just catalogs."
