Rostros populares, rostros populistas: para una semiótica de la efigie heroica (el caso de José Gervasio Artigas)

The essay focuses on the Uruguayan case-study — of exceptional historical and semiotic interest — of the portrait of José Gervasio Artigas. As there is no portrait of the Uruguyan national hero that represents him in his youth or in his maturity, and as the only existing portrait was drawn by Alfred Demersay in Paraguay when Artigas was already very old and in precarious physical conditions. The archetypal image of his face is due to a reconstruction (and rejuvenation) by Juan Manuel Blanes (1884). The essays carry on a cultural semiotic analysis on the construction of the heroic face.