Gabriel García Márquez Portrait, 1994

Hernan Diaz  

Hernán Díaz (Ibagué, Colombia; 1931-Bogotá; November 30, 2009) was a Colombian photographer, recognized as one of the most representative of the 20th century in the country.

In 1954 he began his studies at The Photographers School, in Westport (Connecticut). During the 1960s, his illustrated books and photographs circulated in prestigious magazines in Latin America and the United States: he worked for Life and Time, and for the newspaper The Christian Science Monitor. In Colombia, his work was disseminated through the magazines Cromos (it had a weekly section titled Encuentros con Hernán Díaz), Credencial and Semana.

His work as a photographer had a special boost from the Colombian-Argentine art critic Marta Traba, who in the late 1950s promoted him along with other modern artists such as Fernando Botero, Alejandro Obregón, Enrique Grau, Guillermo Wiedemann, Eduardo Ramírez Villamizar and Edgar Negret.

In 1963 he published, in collaboration with Marta Traba, his book titled Six Contemporary Colombian Artists. And later, he published Cartagena morena (1972); Diary of a Devastation (1979); The blue borders of Colombia (1982); Illustrious Guest House of Colombia (1985); Always Cartagena (1992) and Portraits (1993).

Some photographic prints of his works are preserved in institutions such as the Museum of Art of the National University of Colombia, the Museum of Modern Art of Bogotá and the National Museum of Colombia.