Victorina Durán Cebrián (11 December 1899 – 10 December 1993) was a Spanish

set Set, The Set, SET or SETS may refer to: Science, technology, and mathematics Mathematics *Set (mathematics), a collection of elements *Category of sets, the category whose objects and morphisms are sets and total functions, respectively Electro ...

and

costume Costume is the distinctive style of dress and/or makeup of an individual or group that reflects class, gender, occupation, ethnicity, nationality, activity or epoch—in short, culture. The term also was traditionally used to describe typica ...

designer, chair of costumes and scenography at the National Conservatory, and

avant-garde In the arts and literature, the term ''avant-garde'' ( meaning or ) identifies an experimental genre or work of art, and the artist who created it, which usually is aesthetically innovative, whilst initially being ideologically unacceptable ...

artist associated with the

surrealist Surrealism is an art movement, art and cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists aimed to allow the unconscious mind to express itself, often resulting in the depiction of illogical or dreamlike s ...

movement of the 1920s and 30s. After going into exile in Argentina, she became director of the

Teatro Colón The Teatro Colón () is a historic opera house in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It is considered one of the ten best opera houses in the world by National Geographic. According to a survey carried out by the acoustics expert Leo Beranek among leadin ...

in Buenos Aires.

Biography

Born into a bourgeois, traditionalist, and cultured family – owners of the

Teatro Real The Teatro Real () is an opera house in Madrid, Spain. Located at the Plaza de Oriente, opposite the Royal Palace, and known colloquially as "''El Real''" (The Royal One). it is considered the top institution of the performing and musical arts ...

's number 1 season ticket – Victorina Durán was the daughter of a dancer of that theater and a career soldier. When her desire to be an actress was rejected by the family, she consoled herself with studying drawing and painting. That led her to meet and interact with characters such as

Salvador Dalí Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (11 May 190423 January 1989), known as Salvador Dalí ( ; ; ), was a Spanish Surrealism, surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, ...

Remedios Varo María de los Remedios Alicia Rodriga Varo y Uranga (known as Remedios Varo, 16 December 1908 – 8 October 1963) was a Spanish and Mexican surrealist painter. Early life and education María de los Remedios Alicia Rodriga Varo y Uranga was bo ...

, Maruja Mallo, and

Rosa Chacel Rosa Clotilde Chacel Arimón (June 3, 1898 – July 27, 1994) was a famous and sometimes controversial writer from Spain. She was a native of Valladolid. Early life Chacel was born in Valladolid, the daughter of a teacher who sent her to liv ...

. After completing her studies at the

Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando The Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando (RABASF; ), located on the Calle de Alcalá in the centre of Madrid, currently functions as a museum and gallery. A public law corporation, it is integrated together with other Spanish royal aca ...

in Madrid from 1917 to 1926, in 1929 she won the Chair of Costumes and Scenographic Art, becoming the first woman to obtain this position in Spain. Durán had previously distinguished herself as a

batik Batik is a dyeing technique using wax Resist dyeing, resist. The term is also used to describe patterned textiles created with that technique. Batik is made by drawing or stamping wax on a cloth to prevent colour absorption during the dyein ...

artist, forming part of the Spanish delegation at the

International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts The International Exhibition of Modern Decorative and Industrial Arts () was a specialized exhibition held in Paris, France, from April 29 (the day after it was inaugurated in a private ceremony by the President of France) to November 8, 1925 (O ...

of Paris in 1925. A year later she was part of the group of intellectual women and artists gathered by Maria de Maeztu to found the (within which she was a key player in the development of the Sapphic Circle of Madrid). She also worked with Rivas Cherif on the creation of the Theater School of Art (TEA) in Madrid, and made costumes and sets for the companies of

Margarita Xirgu Margarita Xirgu Subirá ( ; 18 June 1888 – 25 April 1969) was a Spanish stage actress, who was greatly popular throughout her country and Latin America. A friend of the poet Federico García Lorca, she was forced into exile during Franci ...

Federico García Lorca Federico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca (5 June 1898 – 19 August 1936) was a Spanish poet, playwright, and theatre director. García Lorca achieved international recognition as an emblematic member of the Generation of '27, a g ...

, and . She also made sets and decorations for films such as ''

Blood Wedding ''Blood Wedding'' () is a tragedy by Spanish dramatist Federico García Lorca. It was written in 1932 and first performed at Teatro Beatriz in Madrid in March 1933, then later that year in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The play is set in rural Spa ...

''. As a decorator and scenographer in 1930s Spain, Durán freed herself from the "archeology of the naturalist school", creating an innovative blend of "avant-garde and popular

costumbrismo ''Costumbrismo'' (in Catalan: ''costumisme''; sometimes anglicized as costumbrism, with the adjectival form costumbrist) is the literary or pictorial interpretation of local everyday life, mannerisms, and customs, primarily in the Hispanic sce ...

". She wrote about her renovating aesthetic ideas in a series of articles published in the newspapers ' and '' La Libertad'' from 1935 to 1936 under the title ''Escenografía y vestuario'' (''Scenography and Costumes''). After the

Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...

erupted, in 1937 she accompanied Margarita Xirgu in her American exile and took up residence in Argentina. In that country, she simultaneously played the role of artistic director of the Colón and

Cervantes Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra ( ; ; 29 September 1547 (assumed) – 22 April 1616 NS) was a Spanish writer widely regarded as the greatest writer in the Spanish language and one of the world's pre-eminent novelists. He is best known for his no ...

theaters. In collaboration with Susana Aquino she inspired the creation of ''La Cuarta Carabela'', the Spanish Association of Seven Arts, the Indigenous Theater Group, and worked as a costume designer with the choreographer Mercedes Quintana. As a painter she exhibited in countries such as Uruguay, Brazil, Chile, Germany, and France. She broke her exile in 1949 to collaborate with Dalí on the ''

Don Juan Tenorio ''Don Juan Tenorio: Drama religioso-fantástico en dos partes'' (Don Juan Tenorio: Religious-Fantasy Drama in Two Parts) is a Play (theatre), play written by José Zorrilla and produced in 1844. It is the most romantic of the two principal Span ...

'' directed by

Luis Escobar Kirkpatrick Luis Escobar y Kirkpatrick, 7th Marquess of Marismas del Guadalquivir (5 September 1908 – 16 February 1991), was a Spanish nobleman and actor. He was an actor, playwright, and theatre director who advanced the interests of Teatro Marí ...

at the National Theater of Spain. From then on, she traveled frequently to Europe – especially Paris and Madrid – and in the 1980s she settled permanently in the Spanish capital. She died in Madrid at age 93. Her epitaph contains the following caption: "I do not know if I will have stopped loving for having died, or I will have died for having stopped loving." In her memoirs, she expressed her "passionate militancy in lesbianism in the context of a stale and intolerant Spain." The life and work of Victorina Durán has been the subject of study. Eva María Moreno Lago presented the doctoral thesis ''Victorina Durán escritora y artista del teatro de vanguardia'' at the

University of Seville The University of Seville (''Universidad de Sevilla'') is a university in Seville, Andalusia, Spain. Founded under the name of ''Colegio Santa María de Jesús'' in 1505, in 2022 it has a student body of 57,214,U-Ranking Universidades español ...

in 2018.

References

External links

"Eva Moreno Lago: 'Victorina Durán: figurinista y surrealista en el teatro español del '27'"
Casariche Cursos de Verano Conferencias, at

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Duran, Victorina 1899 births 1993 deaths 20th-century Spanish painters Painters from Madrid Exiles of the Spanish Civil War in Argentina Lesbian painters Spanish LGBTQ painters Spanish lesbian artists Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando alumni Spanish costume designers Spanish scenic designers Spanish surrealist artists Women scenic designers Women surrealist artists LGBTQ history in Spain 20th-century Spanish LGBTQ people 20th-century Spanish women painters Spanish women memoirists