Ever since it was founded, the CAYC (Centro de Arte y Comunicación), helmed by the cultural promoter, artist, and businessman Jorge Glusberg, was intended as an interdisciplinary space where an experimental art movement could flourish. The establishment of collaborative networks connecting local and international artists and critics played an important role in this process. The exhibitions shone a light on these exchanges, in which overviews of trends or individual artists provided an introduction to the innovations of international contemporary art and made Argentine and Latin American artists better known on the global scene.
In 1974 the CAYC began focusing a great deal of its attention on this project, promoting a variety of initiatives in exhibitions that traveled around a contemporary circuit of new cultural spaces and centers that were emerging in Europe at the time. The exhibition Arte de Sistemas en Latinoamérica visited several European cities from 1974 to 1976, presenting an overview of the region’s recent works adapted to the concept of systems art.
Going back to the CAYC’s very early years, showing films was an important part of the center’s exhibition programs, in keeping with its goal of positioning itself as a space for experimental work, especially for projects that sought to combine art, technology, and communication. The CAYC thus continued doing the work that the Instituto Torcuato Di Tella had been doing in Argentina in the 1960s, motivating the avant-garde as it challenged the mass media, encouraging an exploration of interdisciplinary approaches, and supporting visual artists who were trying their hands in the fields of radical theater, fashion, design, and film. In Glusberg’s view, collaborative works of that kind provided a way to promote a new social order.
Activities of this sort became a regular part of the CAYC’s programs in 1974, when Glusberg took part in Open Circuits. An International Conference on the Future of Television, at MoMA in New York, and then in the Encuentros Internacionales de Video presented at the center in Buenos Aires and in London, Paris, Ferrara, Antwerp, Caracas, Barcelona, Lima, Mexico City, and Tokyo.
One year earlier, Glusberg joined forces with Pedro Roth and Danilo Galasse to create Ediciones del Tercer Mundo (Third World Editions), a collective that promoted the production of Latin American publications and videos and organized festivals for non-commercial films. The term “non-commercial” was a reference to films that were shot on Single 8, Super 8, and 16 mm film by amateur filmmakers, as distinct from the 35 mm film used in commercial productions.
The Bruges Triennial in Belgium had, since 1968, exhibited contemporary art and architecture in public spaces. When the CAYC was invited to take part in the 1974 edition, it presented a selection of the films produced recently in Argentina, such as Antologías by Rafael Hastings (GT-329 [doc. no. 1476494]), El Grupo de los Trece, and Luis Benedit en diálogo con Jorge Glusberg. Some of these films had already been shown at international events in Berlin [GT-311 (doc. no. 1476449), Milan [GT-312 (doc. no. 1476450)]), and New York [GT-353 (doc. no. 1476499)].
