Francisco Gil-Tovar

Art critic and historian, Francisco Gil-Tovar, died on July 14 in the city of Bogota. A great teacher in the best sense of the word, Gil-Tovar possessed an incredible sense of humor that allowed him to instill in his students a great passion for art, history and journalism, the areas in which he developed his work in Colombia. Francisco Gil-Tovar arrived to Colombia from Granada, Spain, in 1953, to give a series of conferences at the Biblioteca Nacional. He eventually settled in Colombia because, as he would say, "why not?" Initially, because Jesuit priest José Rafael Arboleda suggested to him that, since he happened to be in Colombia, "why not" teach a class in Spanish Literature at the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana; and was later invited by the Universidad Nacional to teach a course in Spanish Art because "why not" since he was already in the country." This "why not" turned into a 64-year stay. A humanist, writer, and university professor, Gil-Tovar wrote more than fifty books on art in Colombia and Spain, including: Introducción al arte (Introduction to Art) and Historia del arte e iniciación al conocimiento de los estilos (History of Art and Introduction to the Knowledge of Styles). Associate professor at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia's Art Department; Dean of the Department of Social Communication and Director of the Art Department of the Pontificia Universidad Javeriana de Colombia; Founder and Co-Director of the Centro de Educación Humanística of the Universidad del Rosario in Bogota; in addition to teaching at the Universidad de los Andes and the Universidad Santo Tomás, among others. He was also a visiting professor at several other universities abroad. He was a columnist for the Arte en Colombia/ArtNexus magazine, for El Tiempo newspaper, and collaborated for other specialized publications in Spain and Latin America. Gil-Tovar was president of the Asociación Internacional de Críticos de Arte (AICA) in Colombia, and, in 2016, was recognized with the Gold Medal for Merit in the Field of Culture granted by the Colombian Ministry of Culture. The entire team of Arte en Colombia/ArtNexus and its director, Celia Sredni de Birbragher, send a heart-felt message of condolences to his family and express their profound gratitude for the important contributions made by Francisco Gil-Tovar in the academic and the visual arts fields in Colombia, and particularly for the donation of his books to the Fundación ArtNexus.