MEXICO CITY.- The Museo Soumaya presents Covarrubias. Since Covarrubias's death in 1957, his work has enjoyed only five major exhibitions in this hemisphere, including three in Mexico and two in the United States. The first major showing of Covarrubias's work in the United States appeared in 1984 at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery, focusing exclusively on his caricatures. In 2000, the Mexican Museum in San Francisco presented the exhibition "Covarrubias: The Rosa and Miguel Covarrubias Collection," featuring works by Covarrubias as well as the husband and wife's private collection of Mexican pre-conquest artifacts, photographs, ceramic ware and works by other Mexican artists.

Covarrubias (1904-1957) is internationally recognized today as a key participant in the cultural exchange between his native Mexico and the United States after World War I.

After his arrival in New York City in 1923, Covarrubias's artistic potential was quickly recognized by the novelist and influential critic Carl Van Vechten as well as Vanity Fair's Editor Frank Crowninshield, a man of impeccable taste and a champion of modernist trends in New York society.

It was Van Vechten who said in 1925, "From the beginning I was amazed at [Covarrubias's] ability to size up a person on a blank sheet of paper at once; there was a certain clairvoyance in this."

Covarrubias was also a writer and used his exceptional artistic talent to illustrate his own books as well as books by other authors. His first book, "The Prince of Wales and other Famous Americans," established him as one of New York City's leading modern caricaturists. His illustrations for W. C. Handy's "Blues: An Anthology" (1926), Langston Hughes's first book of verse, "The Weary Blues" (1926), and his own book, "Negro Drawings" (1927), were created in the new spirit that arose out of Harlem's Renaissance.

Covarrubias also studied and wrote about non-Western cultures. This interest led him to Bali, where a Guggenheim Fellowship allowed him to study and write a book on the island's culture.

In the mid-1930s, Covarrubias returned to Mexico to live with his wife Rosa Rolanda. The couple had met in New York City where she was a respected modern dancer. Their home in Tizapán, just outside Mexico City, became a famous international stopover for artists, similar to Virginia Woolf's home in Bloomsbury and Gertrude Stein's in Paris.

Covarrubias turned his attention and energies to researching the ancient cultures of the Americas, particularly those in Mexico. He became a leading anthropologist, ethnologist and educator during the latter part of his career. He taught at the National School of Anthropology and History in the 1940s and 1950s, and as head of the Department of Dance at the National Institute of Fine Arts, he introduced modern dance to Mexico City's audiences.