La Jornada: Between art and sport, Abel Quezada gains relevance in social and political events

The illustrations by Abel Quezada (1920-1991) are so current that they could be published tomorrow and they would still have informative relevance, said Ery Camara Thiam, in charge of the exhibition’s curatorial concept. Mexico-Mexico-Mexico! Abel Quezada between art and sportduring a tour of the exhibition that opens today.

Mounted at the Kaluz Museum on the occasion of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the exhibition brings together 82 works by the Monterrey cartoonist – including cartoons, paintings, watercolors and unpublished archival material – that show his love for disciplines such as baseball, boxing, tennis and soccer. Beyond the sporting field, the selection highlights the humor, irony and sharp social criticism that defined his artistic production.

The exhibition also recovers two of his lesser-known facets: that of a filmmaker and that of a painter. Although he began painting at the age of 45, after a long career as a draftsman, he approached this discipline with humility. “He was very respectful of art because he did not consider himself a professional painter; he said he was a Sunday painter,” explained Camara Thiam, also responsible for the conservation area of ​​the cultural site’s collections.

“It wasn’t until 1984 that he exhibited two of his paintings for the first time. Then, the public told him: ‘You can’t keep what you paint, we need to know it’. That’s when he let himself go and presented his work in galleries and museums.” As an artist, Quezada was so modest that he did not participate in the art market. “He always lent his works to his friends, he did not sell them.” The curator pointed out the case of a piece in which, on the back, the caricaturist left a message: “I am lending it to the Tamayo Museum for 99 years.”

Mexico-Mexico-Mexico! Abel Quezada between art and sport –made up of material from the Quezada Rueda Family Collection (whose archive houses more than 16 thousand pieces), the Proyectos Monclova Gallery, the Kaluz Museum and individuals–, is organized into three cores: one for presentation and two more about sports, in addition to an interactive room in which the public can take ownership of the exhibition, both by reading books and catalogues, and by illustrating and giving life to the cartoonist’s creations.

The first section, titled The multiple faces of Abel Quezadacontextualizes his career through photographs, documents, early works, as well as personal objects: travel notebooks, paintbrushes, “his work tools.” Quezada “did not enter a school to study drawing; he had it naturally. It was his language.” The tour brings together everything from the first cartoons that he sent at the age of 14 by mail from Tamaulipas to different newspapers in Mexico City, to the covers that he illustrated for The New Yorker between 1981 and 1987, with the purpose of showing the evolution of his work.

The game: between art and sport, The second part presents Quezada’s pictorial production, which he began self-taught in 1965. Jockeys, runners, tennis and billiards players, baseball players, boxers, reporters and fans reveal personal memories and passions. On the route it is possible to meet immortal figures such as Fernando Valenzuela and Gerardo, KidGonzalez. Free from academic conventions, the artist built his own language, humorous and lyrical, characterized by freshness.

Satire on the fans

The third core Criticism and humor on the courtand the most current of all, recovers oil paintings, watercolors and cartoons about football published in newspapers Cheers, Excelsior, News y Latest News. Through his creations, Quezada criticized and satirized the reality of the Mexican people and their love of sports. His work not only represents soccer teams competing on a field, but also sports as a social phenomenon crossed by political, economic and media interests.

60 years after the creation of some of the cartoons exhibited in the exhibition, Ery Camara and the illustrator’s son, named Abel like his father, confessed they were surprised by the validity of the material. “We could publish two or three or all of them and they would be very current.”

Camara Thiam, for his part, emphasized the relevance of the work of someone who was recognized in 1989 by the magazine Time as one of the 10 best cartoonists in the world, because “he used to combine drawing with his own literature. He wrote the texts himself, and that combination has an eloquence that transcends time.”

Throughout these three sections, the public will find characters, symbols and images representative of public life and Mexican culture: the train as a historical figure, Carlos Monsiváis, María Félix, public officials, former presidents, writers, intellectuals and athletes, as well as the famous Covered and the dog Solovinotwo of Abel Quezada’s most emblematic creations.

Mexico-Mexico-Mexico! Abel Quezada between art and sport It will be available until August 31, from Wednesday to Monday, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., at the Kaluz Museum, located at 85 Hidalgo Avenue, in the capital’s Historic Center.