On the Cover: October 2020

Our cover this month, Hombre en la ventana by Rufino Tamayo, sold for $4,375 at Christie’s Latin American Art Online sale on July 21–Aug. 4, 2020. Tamayo was raised in Mexico City and later spent time living in New York City, where he painted some of his most respected works.

While Tamayo’s work was welcomed with open arms in the United States, with an exhibition just a month after his stateside arrival, he was ostracized for his apolitical stance back home. It was only on his subsequent return, after finding success in the United States and elsewhere, that his work became well respected in Mexico. 

During the later years of his career, Tamayo, with the help of printmaker Luis Remba, developed a new print technique called “Mixografia.” This new medium allowed for three-dimensional texture in his prints. The image featured on our cover is one of 10 Mixografia prints presented at Christie’s Latin American Art Online sale.

Hombre en la ventana, a silhouette of a lone man standing by a window, brings to mind the early days of quarantine when many of us wistfully longed to return back to our pre-pandemic routines. And, while many aspects of society are slowly coming back to life as we adjust to living in a pandemic, the resulting economic downturn and the uncertainty of how the election results will affect estate planning seem to have taken their toll on the charitable giving landscape. Our Committee Report on Philanthropy takes an in-depth look at some of the challenges and opportunities for charities.