Creator of the mythical little men in hats that populate his satirical work, Antonio Segui is the author of a prolific figurative oeuvre of paintings, prints, lithographs and engravings that illustrate an ironic vision of society, steeped in nostalgia and of poetry.
Although he has lived in France since the 1960s, the artist was in Argentina with his wife, a source from the Ministry of Culture confirmed to AFP.
Antonio Segui died of heart failure after hip surgery, La Nacion newspaper reported, citing relatives linked to his family.
Born on January 11, 1934 in Cordoba, 700 km west of Buenos Aires, Antonio Segui organized some 200 individual exhibitions during his long career.
In France, he was promoted in 2018 to the rank of officer in the order of Arts and Letters and was a member of the European Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters.
After studying painting and sculpture in France and Spain from 1951, he traveled throughout Latin America and finally settled in France in 1963.
In 2005, the Center Pompidou devoted the first retrospective to him, in France, of his works on paper, highlighting "a work where humor and poetry defy all pre-established styles".
"I don't see what else to do but work," Antonio Segui told AFP in an interview in Paris when he presented in 2019, at the age of 85, an exhibition of half a hundred of his works. to the National Library of France (BNF), to which he had just donated half a thousand of them, including prints, portfolios and illustrated books.
Argentinian artist Antonio Seguí in front of some of his works during an exhibition at the National Library of France (BNF) on June 5, 2019 in Paris Geoffroy VAN DER HASSELT AFP / Archives
Although living in France, he never stopped returning to Argentina, except during the years of the dictatorship (1976-1983), when the military even refused to renew his passport.
"With art, you can easily say things, it's the only way to fight seriously," he told AFP.
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