Saturn 

Author: María Izquierdo

Name: Saturno (Saturn)

Date: 1935

Material: Watercolor on paper affixed to cardboard

Dimensions: Unknown

Location: Lost

In 1936, French writer Antonin Artaud spent time in Mexico, where he developed a close friendship with María Izquierdo. Artaud praised her work for embodying what he called the “Indian spirit,” a profound connection to Mexico’s pre-Hispanic cultural roots, in contrast to the influence of Western intellectual traditions that he observed in other Mexican painters. When Artaud returned to France, he took approximately 40 of Izquierdo’s paintings, intending to exhibit them in Paris in 1937. However, following the exhibition at the Van den Berg Gallery in Montparnasse, Izquierdo requested the return of her works, only to be told by Artaud that they had been stolen. Although Izquierdo consistently rejected the Surrealist label, Artaud’s praise and his emphasis on the dreamlike and primitive aspects of her painting contributed to reinforcing that association in both France and Mexico.

One of the standout works from this period is Saturn, one of the paintings that went missing after the Paris exhibition. While the figure of Saturn has traditionally been associated with melancholy and creative genius, Izquierdo offers a markedly different interpretation. In her painting, Saturn’s influence appears not as a source of inspiration but as a force of oppression, particularly affecting women. The composition depicts female figures in states of bondage and submission, evoking a sense of entrapment under the planet’s power. Desolate landscapes and symbolic elements, such as columns, celestial bodies, and stormy skies, intensify the scene’s emotional charge, recasting Saturn as an agent of gendered domination. This reversal challenges conventional readings of the planet’s meaning and positions Izquierdo’s work within a broader critique of patriarchal structures, drawing on astrological imagery to articulate a distinctly feminist perspective.