Diego Lasansky (born December 6, 1994, Iowa City, IowaDiego Lasansky continues family artistic legacy in Iowa City) is an American artist whose focus is on printmaking, painting, and drawing. He lives in Iowa City, Iowa.
Biography Diego Lasansky is a painter and printmaker. Prior to his formal college education, Diego Lasansky learned about artistic processes not only from his grandfather, Mauricio Lasansky, but also from his uncles, three of whom are professional artists, William, Leonardo, and Tomas Lasansky. Lasansky’s work is figurative, and, like his grandfather, tends to focus on subjects readily available to him—such as family members—and those of historical and personal significance. Early success came to Diego Lasansky in his series Portrait at Eighteen. This was a series of 50 intaglio self-portraits, all of which were distinguishable from the others. In 2015 the Cedar Rapids Museum of Art published a monograph on Lasansky.
One of his more recent portraits is of Martin Luther as Junker Jörg. This image of Martin Luther was created in the medium of intaglio printmaking and commemorates the 500th year anniversary of the Reformation. This portrait considers the figurative and formal elements of a portrait of Martin Luther prior to him assuming the identity or persona of Junker Jörg as he went into hiding:
Work In 2014, Lasansky began work on an intaglio print depicting Martin Luther as Junker Jörg. The print depicts Luther as Junker Jörg (translated to Knight George), the persona he adopted during his stay at Wartburg Castle, where he translated the New Testament from Greek into German. In 2016, Lasansky gifted 40 original intaglio prints of Martin Luther to Wartburg College in celebration of the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation. Each copy of Junker Jörg 1521 was created in Lasansky’s studio over a six-month period. The intaglio printmaking process involves etching and engraving on a flat piece of copper:
Personal life On January 18, 2020, Diego's father, Luis Phillip Lasansky, son of Mauricio Lasansky, died unexpectedly at the age of 65. Phillip was the director of the Lasansky Corporation for more than forty years.
Selected collections Augsburg University, Minneapolis, Minnesota Augustana University, Sioux Falls, South Dakota Bisignano Art Gallery, University of Dubuque, Dubuque, Iowa Brauer Museum of Art, Valparaiso University, Valparaiso, Indiana Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, Cedar Rapids, Iowa China Printmaking Museum, Gulan, Longhua New District, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China College of Dentistry, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa Concordia College New York, Bronxville, New York Concordia Gallery, Concordia University-Saint Paul, St. Paul, Minnesota Concordia Seminary St. Louis, Missouri Concordia University Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor, Michigan Concordia University of Edmonton, Lutheran Seminary, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada Concordia College Moorhead, Moorhead, Minnesota Concordia University Wisconsin, Mequon, Wisconsin Department of Art and Design, College of Humanities, Concordia University, St. Paul, Minnesota Dubuque Museum of Art, Dubuque, Iowa Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), Churchwide Ministries, Chicago, Illinois Finlandia University Hancock, Michigan George R. White Library and Learning Center, Concordia University, Portland, Oregon Gettysburg College, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania Gloria Dei Lutheran Church, Iowa City, Iowa Grand View University, Des Moines, Iowa Gustavus Adolphus College, St. Peter, Minnesota Heritage Collection, Augustana Teaching Museum, Augustana College, Rock Island, Illinois John and Linda Friend Art Gallery, Concordia University Irvine, Irvine, California Joel and Lila Harnett Print Study Center University of Richmond Museum, Richmond, Virginia Kristin Wigley-Fleming Fine Arts Gallery, Luther College, Decorah, Iowa Lenoir–Rhyne University, Hickory, North Carolina Luther College University of Regina, Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada Luther Memorials Foundation of Saxony-Anhalt, The Saxony-Anhalt Museum Association, Wittenberg, Germany Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois Lutheran Theological Library, University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Lutheran Theological Seminary University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada Marxhausen Art Gallery, Concordia University Nebraska, Seward, Nebraska Mingenback Art Gallery, Bethany College, Lindsborg, Kansas Newberry College Newberry, South Carolina Office of the General Secretary, Lutheran World Federation, Geneva, Switzerland Olin Hall Gallery, Roanoke College, Salem, Virginia Pacific Lutheran Theological Seminary, Berkeley, California Pacific Lutheran University, Tacoma, Washington Raclin Murphy Museum of Art, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana Springfield Museum of Art, Wittenberg University, Springfield, Ohio St. Paul’s Lutheran Church & School, Waverly, Iowa Stiftung Lutherhaus, Lutherhaus Eisenach, Eisenach, Germany Susquehanna University, Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania Texas Lutheran University, Sequin, Texas Thiel College, Greenville, Pennsylvania United States Embassy in Latvia, Riga, Latvia University of Hawaii at Hilo, Hilo, Hawaii Waldorf University Foundation, Forest City, Iowa Wartburg College, Waverly, Iowa Wartburg Theological Seminary, Dubuque, Iowa William Rolland Gallery of Fine Art, California Lutheran University, Thousand Oaks, California Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod, Waukesha, Wisconsin Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary, Mequon, Wisconsin Worcester Art Museum, Worcester, Massachusetts Zion Lutheran Church, Iowa City, Iowa
Notes
Bibliography Ulmer, Sean M. Diego Lasansky: Paintings, Drawings, Prints. Iowa City, IA: Cedar Rapids Museum of Art, (December 5, 2015).
External links Diego Lasansky http://www.diegolasansky.com/assets/diego-lasansky-cv-nov.-9%2c-17.pdf /CV Mauricio Lasansky Cedar Rapids Museum of Art. Information about the exhibition Diego Lasansky: Portrait of the Artist as a young man Intersections: Reforming Church and Academy: 500 Years and Counting "Portrait of the Reformation", Wartburg Magazine, Wartburg College – pg. 21 Diego Lasansky A Family Imprint