This one-page article addresses the recent death of Colombian artist Francisco Antonio Cano. Although it is an obituary, the text presents keys to understanding Cano’s final years and how the myth surrounding his figure as an academic artist was constructed. The author refers to Cano as a “troubled and restless” person who faced many adversities and was hit “in the flesh [by] the blows of incomprehension.”

This brief article on Francisco Antonio Cano (1865-1935) was written on the occasion of his death on May 10, 1935. While clearly sympathetic to Cano, the text describes him in socio-artistic terms. The article also asserts that Cano faced a number of difficulties in the art world, though it does not specify their exact nature. It also provides a written and visual image of some of the works found in the artist’s studio after his death, thus providing information that might make it possible to identify paintings by Cano’s whose whereabouts are still unknown or to pinpoint the date when they were produced. 

Francisco Antonio Cano was closely associated with the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes. In 1898, thanks to a fellowship granted by the Colombian Congress, he studied art at the Académie Julien in Paris, where he also took classes at the Académie Colarossi and the École de Beaux-Arts. Upon returning to Colombia, he was awarded first prize in painting at the Exposición Nacional de Bellas Artes (Bogotá, 1899), an event in which he participated on a number of other occasions (in 1904—when it was organized by distinguished painter Andrés de Santa María—and in 1912, 1915, 1918, 1923, and 1925). He also took part in the Exposición Iberoamericana de Sevilla (Spain) in 1929.