Many years ago, the journalist Javier Martín-Domínguez read Memorias de abajo, Leonora Carrington’s chronicle about her stay in a mental hospital in Santander at the beginning of the 40s. a crazy person falls It is intriguing, exciting and painful at the same time. The book marked me a lot and has always accompanied me”, recalls Martín-Domínguez.

It struck him so much that he decided to meet Carrington in person, the painter inscribed in surrealism who had a certain prestige in the 1960s and 1970s, but who had already been forgotten at the beginning of the century. It wasn’t easy, but in 2008 Martín-Domínguez found Leonora in Mexico, where the artist had settled in her late 40s. He managed to talk to her and went to see her, camera in hand, to interview her.

Carrington, then 89 years old, retained a sharp wit and memories of his movie life. The result of the conversation between the journalist and the painter was the documentary Leonora Carrington and the Surrealist Game, an essential film for art lovers that, however, was kept in a drawer like the artist’s work.

But suddenly Carrington’s paintings became coveted items for collectors. “Her feminism of hers and animalism of hers and the credibility of women as an artist have elevated her in recent years.” Leonora is no longer a stranger. The Venice Biennale dedicated a tribute to him last year, the Mapfre Foundation has exhibited his work in Madrid this winter, his cheapest piece sells for 2.5 million euros and Martín-Domínguez has taken his documentary out of the drawer and has released in movie theaters.

It is an opportunity to learn about the life of “a painter who was already born a surrealist”. “Her mother and her nanny were Irish and they instilled in her the tales and legends of their country with which Leonora developed the imagery of elves and magic that is projected in her work and that is related to that of El Bosco due to the plurality of characters and the landscapes”.

Carrington was a “rebellious girl who was expelled from several schools, so at the age of 20 she left home and went to Paris where she soon joined the group of surrealist painters.” André Breton wrapped her up and she began to paint in the manner of the surrealists “who have such a powerful inner truth that it cannot be hidden and that is so deep that it only manifests itself in her art”.

The painter immediately established a love relationship with Max Ernst, another member of the group. The couple settled in the countryside, but when the Nazis entered France they arrested Ernst and Leonora fled to Spain. “She had to suffer an episode of imbalance that was accentuated when she was raped in El Retiro and her father managed to get her admitted to Dr. Morales’ clinic in Santander. She never forgave him.”

She managed to escape and fled Europe by marrying a Mexican diplomat. She later separated and married Emerico Weisz. In Mexico, her painting was enriched with the energy of the Kabbalah, the tarot and the Mayan culture, which “are the grammar that Carrington uses to atone for her complex inner world. Leonora is the painter of magic, hers is the art of madness seen from within”.