To:
Ana Botín O’Shea
President Grupo Santander
Héctor Grisi Checa
CEO Grupo Santander
Laura Diez-Barroso Azcárraga
Chairwoman Grupo Santander Mexico
Sam Keller
Director Fondation Beyeler
Klaus Biesenbach
Director Neue Nationalgalerie
Ingrid Røynesdal
Director National Museum of Norway
This text is deeply shaped by a place, a life, and a legacy: Mexico, Frida Kahlo, and the future of the Gelman Collection—one of the most important collections of Mexican art in the world.
Frida Kahlo is, by any measure, the most renowned Mexican artist in history. Her cultural presence is so profound that millions across the world speak of her simply by her first name: Frida.
Her greatest creation was, in many ways, herself. That creation lives on not only in her paintings but also in her home, her writings, her relationships, her image, and the life she consciously shaped as an artistic statement.
The Gelman Collection contains eleven paintings by Frida Kahlo, all declared Monumento Artístico de la Nación (Artistic Monuments of the Nation) by presidential decree in 1984. Mexico’s heritage legislation is among the most rigorous in the world. It was crafted to strike a careful balance: enabling the international dissemination of Mexican culture while safeguarding the tangible heritage of the Mexican people within the nation’s borders.
Among these works, two paintings—Self-Portrait with Monkeys (1943) and Diego in My Mind (1943)—are widely regarded by scholars and experts as masterpieces essential to understanding Kahlo’s artistic development and intellectual universe.
Yet for eighteen years an entire generation in Mexico has been deprived of the permanent public presence that the original owners envisioned for this collection.
This situation is a consequence of a series of infamous decisions made by Robert Littman, who was the executor of Mrs. Natasha Gelman’s will, and who subsequently became not only curator of the collection, but also its owner, for reasons that are still unclear.
More recently, Banco Santander has reached a financial agreement with Mr. Marcelo Zambrano—who acquired part of the collection from Littman some years ago and has since dispersed portions of it through private sales and public auctions—to “manage” the Gelman Collection and to display it “in a permanent but dynamic way” at the new Faro Santander museum. This was stated by the museum’s director, Daniel Vega Pérez, in an interview published by El País (1/21/26).
In that interview, Mr. Vega Pérez suggested that Mexican law is “flexible,” and mistakenly attributed to the legal framework governing Frida Kahlo’s work a phrase found in decrees rather concerning the works of Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco, stating that they “may be permanently exported.”
The legal framework protecting Kahlo’s work is, in fact, the strictest of them all and categorically prohibits permanent export. Mr. Vega Pérez also described the requirement that these works return to Mexico as “a mere formality,” suggesting that the “preservation of the works” should weigh more heavily than what he characterized as “customs control.” Such interpretations, if accepted, would effectively undermine the legal protections afforded to the work of Frida Kahlo and could open the door for the de facto permanent export of works declared Artistic Monuments of the Nation.
A discussion about whether this law is appropriate for current times may take place, but until that law is changed, the reality is that the permanent home for this collection, with all due respect, is not Santander, but Mexico.
Hundreds of members of Mexico’s artistic and cultural communities have therefore called upon the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura (INBAL)—the institution in charge of the care of works protected by decree—to make the export permits public and to disclose the criteria under which these unusually lengthy authorizations were granted. Likewise, the intervention of the Mexican state is needed to safeguard these works while this situation is clarified and to ensure that the interests of the Mexican people remain paramount—specifically by guaranteeing that the works ultimately enter a public or private institutional collection committed to their permanent exhibition in Mexico.
The importance of the forthcoming exhibitions at the Fondation Beyeler in Switzerland, the National Museum of Norway, and the Neue Nationalgalerie in Germany for the study and legacy of Frida Kahlo is beyond question. As it is the rigorous research and curatorial work carried out by the teams at these institutions in preparing these exhibitions. However, given our shared admiration for Frida Kahlo and the universal significance of her work, it is essential that these institutions stand in solidarity with Mexican citizens in defending our cultural heritage and our laws. It would be appropriate for them to join our call for full transparency from the INBAL. The publics of Switzerland, Norway, and Germany deserve the assurance that these prestigious institutions are working with permits issued in full accordance with Mexican law.
No ticket sales, visitor numbers, sponsorships, or other forms of revenue can justify a project that would deprive the people of Mexico of access in their own country to a vital part of their heritage—an inheritance that is inseparable from the country’s cultural identity. We must be clear: at its core, this situation represents, more than anything else, a speculative financial operation which needs your money, your prestige, and your validation to be successful.
A question can be respectfully posed to Banco Santander: ¿Cómo pueden los mexicanos confiar su patrimonio financiero a un banco que, con sus decisiones, decide despojarlos de su patrimonio cultural? (How can Mexicans entrust their financial assets to a bank that, through its decisions, chooses to strip them of their cultural heritage?)
Ms. Ana Botín O’Shea, you have posted about your long-term commitment with Mexico. Please reconsider.
@defensadelacolecciongelman
This is the fourth letter asking all parties for action regarding the imminent departure of the Gelman Collection from Mexico. A link to the first letter and the list of signatories is provided here, and is constantly being updated.
