A member of Generación de la Ruptura (Breakaway Generation), Roger Von Gunten was among his contemporaries who broke away from Mexican muralism. Leaving behind social expression and introducing a more personal form of abstract expressionism, Von Gunten evokes whimsical and moody colors that dabble in everyday emotions and engage with spirituality and surrealist expressions.

Roger von Gunten is a Swiss painter and sculptor who became a naturalized Mexican citizen. He was born in Zurich, Switzerland, in 1933. He studied painting at the Zurich School of Arts and Crafts.
After completing his studies in painting and graphic design at the Kunstgewerbeschule under the direction of Johannes Itten, a color theorist of the Bauhaus school, he held his first exhibition in 1956 in his native Switzerland. In 1957, he came to Mexico with plans to travel south along the newly opened Pan-American Highway, but he ran out of money and stayed. He initially studied etching at the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City with Guillermo Silva Santamaria, but, having little love for city life, soon moved to Tacámbaro in the State of Michoacán. Later, he moved to a home on the slopes of Tepozteco Mountain near the village of Tepoztlan, in Morelos.