In Focus | Ecos del Primer Dios by Emilia Cantor

Latin American Contemporary Painting

This week I’ve chosen a new painting by the Latin American painter Emilia Cantor. Titled Ecos del Primer Dios (Echoes of the First God), it feels suspended between night and revelation. A luminous, mask-like face rises behind darkened buildings, its gold cutting through indigo sky. The composition is spare yet charged with unease.

The title points to a divine or primordial presence. “Echoes” hints at vibration and voice, an after-sound that persists beyond its source. Primer Dios — the first god — suggests creation and forgotten cosmologies, ideas that Emilia later expands on in describing the Sun as a force that “sings the world into existence.

The idea of the Sun as the first god appears across many ancient cosmologies, from the Egyptian Ra to the Aztec Tonatiuh and the Incan Inti, each representing light as the origin of life and knowledge. In Ecos del Primer Dios, that belief is reimagined: colour radiates, becoming voice and a vibration that carries the weight of consciousness.

Emilia Cantor, Ecos del Primer Dios, Oil on canvas, 60 x 60 cm | 23.6 x 23.6 in.

Why this image?

What draws me most to Ecos del Primer Dios is its handling of night. The deep purples and blues seem to pulse against the darkness. The shadows cast across the buildings create an intimacy that edges toward claustrophobia.

The face that emerges from this darkness, rising above the buildings, feels protective yet intrusive. It watches, perhaps even listens, as if collecting the echoes its title refers to. Emilia’s own words underscore that sensibility:

“This work revisits the ancient belief of the Sun as the first deity, the original source of creation and consciousness,” she explains. “The radiant face emerging between shadowed buildings evokes a moment when divinity and matter converge. The open mouth suggests sound as a generative force, referencing the idea that the universe originated through vibration rather than form." -- Emilia Cantor, 2025

I find myself returning to that small strip of light red beneath the face. It's an area of the canvas that, for me, vibrates with energy. It grounds the image in the material world.

I love Emilia’s deep violet sky meeting the black of the street with deliberate tension, while the ochre and grey of the buildings absorb and reflect its glow. The colour relationships build a mood, a tangible atmosphere. The scene feels architectural and spiritual, its composition guiding the eye upward toward the glowing face.

The face, haloed in gold, recalls the sun deities of early civilisations and the devotional iconography of Catholic art. Yet it feels theatrical, even cinematic, with its expression ambiguous, poised between revelation and warning. A faint green brushstroke across the forehead breaks the gold, adding an unsettling note of humanity, as though something earthly is breaking through the divine façade.

Emilia Cantor and Latin American Contemporary Painting

Emilia trained at the Florence Academy of Art in Italy, where she developed a strong foundation in classical drawing and painting. That academic discipline remains at the core of her practice, visible in the structure and clarity of her compositions. Yet over time, Emilia has shifted toward a contemporary visual language in which colour, rather than line, becomes the architecture of the image. This balance between structure and vivid colour align her with a new generation of artists shaping Latin American contemporary painting.

She works with a restrained but expressive palette, using texture and contrast to create tension between order and emotion. The result is a body of work that feels studied yet spontaneous. Her subjects feel unpredictable, as if they developed from within her, perhaps taking her by surprise as they emerged from the canvas. Emilia's subjects also often hover between the familiar and the mysterious. She explores how light defines space and mood, and how human presence can be suggested without being directly shown.

In Ecos del Primer Dios, this dialogue between tradition and experimentation reaches a striking new point. The work encapsulates her technique of juxtaposing classical elements and mythic motifs with a distinctly contemporary edge. It holds the rigour of academic construction yet moves decisively toward abstraction; its geometry is pared back, its meaning deliberately open.

Final thoughts | Latin American contemporary painting

Much of Emilia’s work exudes an intensity in the mysterious, otherworldly scenes she presents. I keep returning to Ecos del Primer Dios, to the face at its centre: the steady gaze, the gold that seems to radiate a low heat, the small green mark that breaks the halo.

Even at a modest scale, it feels monumental. Colour vibrates; shadows absorb light until it seems to breathe back out. For me, it’s one of Emilia’s most compelling recent works, rich in colour and mystery. It’s a painting that feels alive. For me, it’s one of Emilia’s most captivating works to date, and a real moment of something just beyond our understanding.

In Emilia’s own words, “light becomes voice: the Sun no longer only illuminates, it sings the world into existence.”

I’m excited to share this new painting by Emilia Cantor with you, a powerful example of Latin American contemporary painting. Please visit Emilia's artist page to learn more about her and to view her available paintings.

For more information, contact Belinda Seppings at [email protected] or visit miramefineart.com.

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