Photographer Sara Facio, emblem of Argentine culture, died at 92

Sara Faciowho was one of the greatest exponents of the photography and culture from the country, He died this Tuesday afternoon at the age of 92.. Currently he served as president of the María Elena Walsh Foundationwho was his partner for decades.

Facio is the one behind countless portraits of personalities of Argentine culture, including Julio Cortazar, Alejandra Pizarnik, Jorge Luis Borges, Pablo Neruda and of course, Walsh.

Born in 1932 in the town of San Isidro, she graduated from the National School of Fine Artsin 1953. From there, he was in charge of building an enormously successful career, not only in photography, but also in other fields, such as journalism and curatorship.

One of the points that most marked her career was in its beginnings, since when she obtained a scholarship from the Government of France to study art history with her friend Alicia D’Amicomanaged to train himself by visiting museums, works and producing a book on the history of art.

The history of photography in Argentina

Facio’s career covers -in large part- the history of Argentine photography. Although the mass public’s taste for this discipline only began to manifest itself in this century, our country has a long tradition of talented photographers. And Facio, together with Jorge Glusberg at the National Museum of Fine Arts, She was the first to open the collections to the public. I had already created The rooftopa publishing house to publish books on photography, exclusively.

In 1968 it was published ”Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires”the first photo book signed by Facio and his tutor Annemarie Heinrich, with text by Julio Cortázar. In 1976 he released ”Humanitarian”, in which he published a series of photos of psychiatric institutes, again with texts by Cortázar. In these publications, both photographers set out to capture life in the city, even showing its worst side. She also has on her resume a book on the history of her beloved discipline, titled ”Photography in Argentina: from 1840 to the present day”.

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Facio presided over the María Elena Walsh Foundation, who was his partner

Shortly after the arrival of democracy, he founded the Photo gallery of the San Martín Cultural Center and, in 1998, inaugurated the Fine Arts collection. Since then, the Museum legitimizes the value of the works it treasures with its prestige. To date it has more than 1,500 images.

In recent years, it had an exhibition in Malba from 2018, titled ”Perón”in addition to the tributes he received in 2022 from the Museum of Fine Arts and the Kirchner Cultural Center, within the framework of his 90th birthday.

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Facio became recognized in part for her portraits of writers such as Borges

His works make up the collections of the National museum of fine arts, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) of New York and Reina Sofía National Museum of Art Centerin the Spanish capital, Madrid.

Awards were not spared in his career, as he obtained, among others, the Platinum Konex in 1992for the Best Argentine Photographer of the decade and the National Award for Artistic Career, delivered by the Ministry of Culture of the Nation. Furthermore, it was declared Illustrious Citizen of Buenos Aires in 2011.