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John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston, MA. Photography credit Joel Benjamin
John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston, MA. Photography credit Joel Benjamin
Marina Nuñez Del Prado
John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Boston, MA. Photography credit Joel Benjamin
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Marina Nuñez Del Prado

Bolivian, 1910-1995
Marina Núñez del Prado was one of the most widely acclaimed sculptors of Latin America. Her work is characterized by rolling curves and bulk and by the use of such spectacular materials as black granite, alabaster, basalt and white onyx, as well a different native Bolivian woods. Among her outstanding sculptures White Venus (1960), a stylized female body in white onyx, is among her most admired works. Another famous work is Mother and Child, sculpted in white onyx. She was inspired by Indian themes.

Nuñez studied at the Fine Arts Academy in La Paz where she graduated in 1930. Between 1931-38 she taught sculpture and artistic anatomy at the Academy. During that period, she won the post of chair of sculpture and artistic anatomy at the Academy, becoming the first woman to be appointed to that position. Along her successful career she met outstanding artists such as Pablo Picasso, Constantin Brancusi, poets Alfonsina Storni and Juana de Ibarbourou. She was also a friend of the Bolivian writer Franz Tamayo.

She was born in La Paz, Bolivia on October 17, 1910. Married to Peruvian writer Jorge Falcon, she spent her last twenty five years in Lima, Peru. where she lived and worked up until her death on September 9, 1995.