RAMOS CATALAN (1888-1961)
Cerro el Muerto (6,488 m - 21,286 ft)
Argentina - Chile border
In Mountains landscapes of Andes, oil on canvas
The mountain
Cerro el Muerto (6,488 m - 21,286 ft) sometimes just called "El Muerto" (The Dead One") is a mountain peak of South America and is part of the Andes mountain range. It is also known as the 16th of the largest mountain peaks in the Argentine-Chilean border. Cery difficult to climb, the summit was successful reached first in 1950. The peak does not receive many climbing attempts due to the difficulty of navigating there from the Argentinian side of the mountain. Also, the closest neighboring mountain is Ojos del Salado, South America's second highest peak and highest volcano in the South West, which receives much more tourism in comparison.
The glaciers on the Argentinian/south side offers some good snow and ice climbing and a nice change from scree peaks of the Puna. It's never really steep, even if you have the choice of going up to 60 degrees, but it's long, tough and demanding. The views from the summit are fantastic!
A landscape of blue lagoons, volcanoes and the vasteness of the plateau is stunning.
Source:
- El muerto in Summitpost.org
The painter
Benito Ramos Catalán (1888-1961) was a chilean painter who used to sign "Ramos Catalan". Known for his marines and landscapes of the Andes and Chile, and most particularly for his mountains paintings. Most of them have the same title: "Mountains of Chile" or "Mountains landscapes of Andes", making quite difficult to know which mountain was exactly depicted, in a country which has quite a lot of summits ! To add to the difficulty, he used to paint the most famous mountains of his country under very unusual angles or with proportions that do not correspond exactly to their real size... making even more difficult to recognize and identify them for experts ! That is why today, 55 years after his death, some of these mountains paintings are not clearly identified and presented, in the public sales, as 'possibly' a particular summit of Chile or Andes...
His works are in many Chilean institutions like Viña del Mar Fine Art Museum, O'Higginiano Fine Art Museum in Talca, Valparaiso Fine Art Museum, and Navy Schools in Valparaiso and Talcahuano. Ranos
