Berni, Antonio

Born May 14, 1905, in Rosario. Argentine painter.

In the 1930’s, Berni was one of the founders of the “new realism” in Argentina. Together with D. Siqueiros (in 1934) and such Argentine artists as J. C. Castagnino and L. E. Spilimbergo, he painted a number of murals in Buenos Aires and New York, which primarily dealt with the life and history of the Argentine people. In the painting Midnight Over the World (end of the 1930’s) he created a majestic image of national courage and grief, inspired by the Spanish Civil War. In the middle of the 1920’s he came under the influence of modernism.