Antonio Berni is definitely not the only artist with imaginary friends (Dali for sure had at least one) but he may be the only artist whose imaginary friends became a huge part of his work.

His imaginary friends went by the names of Juanito Laguna and Ramona Montiel. Juanito Laguna was a little boy “from the outskirts of Buenos Aires, or any Latin American capital.” As explained by Berni himself, “Juanito is a poor boy but not a poor boy. He is not a loser by circumstances but a being full of life and hope, who overcomes his circumstantial misery because he intuits living in a world full of future.” Berni made an entire series of works that included the young Juanito Laguna that was exhibited at the Venice Biennial in 1962. Little Juanito captivated his audience and Berni won the Gran Prix for engraving and drawing. I guess it’s not creepy to have imaginary friends at the age of 57 when you win a Gran Prix at a Venice Biennial right?

Ramona Montiel was a more “adult” imaginary friend. Berni befriended her while he was studying art in Paris in the 1960s. She is explained as “a young woman living in the heart of the big city: Buenos Aires. Stung by her work as a seamstress and seduced by luxuries and splendors, as well as by the false promises of ‘a better life,’ she becomes a prostitute.” Both Juanito and Ramona were representations of poverty and the adversities faced by the working class in big cities. These series became the most iconic work of Argentina’s champion of the downtrodden. When he died, they erected a statue in his honor and Juanito and Ramona live on via songs written about them by famous Argentine musicians.

Unfortunately, in 2008, fake cops stole 15 of Berni’s paintings, each worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, while they were in transit from the suburbs of Buenos Aires to the Bellas Artes National Museum.  The “cops” forced the truck to the side of the road and threatened the drivers with guns until they complied. Nothing like fake cops stealing the core of Argentina’s favorite artist's work to ruin your day.