Fernandez studied and developed his career with the National Autonomous University of Mexico, as a protégé of Manuel Toussaint.
His nephew, Justino Reyes Retana Fernández, served in the Mexican Airforce with the 201st Fighter Squadron during World War II.
[1][2] He began school at the Colegio Francés de la Perpetua, but in 1910, he was sent to the United States to avoid the Mexican Revolution.
[3] Before he was established as a writer and researcher, he had a number of jobs to make ends meet, including working as an assistant of an architect.
[4][6] When Toussaint died in 1955, Fernandez became the interim director of the Aesthetic Research Institute with the position becoming permanent the following year.
[4] Publications about the writer include: Homenaje a Justino Fernández en sus 60 años, Del arte.