From the time he was very young, Ronny Vayda (b. 1954) was artistically inclined. Frustrated by the Universidad de Antioquia’s Instituto de Artes, he decided to study architecture at the Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana. It was there that Vayda took in the principles of Bauhaus design. Thanks to the art biennials held in Medellín, he came into contact with geometric and Conceptual art, which greatly influenced him. Later, he studied the work of Anthony Caro and Carl Andre and started teaching. This interview discusses in some detail the impact of a law in Medellín that required constructions of a certain magnitude to include a sculpture (the law was repealed in 1994). Vayda’s work has focused on exploring, as he puts it, “the hardness of iron and the fragility of glass,” though not from a “literary or emotional” point of view.
This interview forms part of a larger project by artist, critic, and cultural advocate Félix Ángel (b. 1949) on art produced in Medellín during the seventies. For it, he interviewed nineteen individuals—artists, critics, and cultural advocates like himself—who were active at the time. With its multiple points of view, this project is essential to understanding the process of modernization that was taking place in art from the Antioquia region in the seventies.