In this catalogue text, critic and essayist José Ratto-Ciarlo praises César Rengifo for his multifaceted work in painting; Rengifo was not only a painter, but also a playwright, journalist, and political activist. Ratto-Ciarlo analyzes the profound changes that have taken place in today’s world in relation to political dogmas and to aesthetics, specifically when compared to past ideals; both are currently characterized by an apocalyptic vision of the human endeavor and the struggles it entails. Ratto-Ciarlo argues that there is an ongoing need for a liberating social “utopia” and that, though utopian visions can be vertiginous, César Rengifo’s work did not cause confusion due to the soundness of his ideological and spiritual stance. Indeed, the solidness of his position allowed him to overcome passing artistic “isms” to concentrate instead on the historical demand for redemption of the oppressed. To exemplify his assertions, Ratto-Ciarlo points out how Rengifo’s art addressed in coherent fashion the problem of “the American being,” the search for “a national being,” and the vindication of the indigenous and of oppressed people’s pursuit of social redemption. In closing, Ratto-Ciarlo posits four crucial phases in Rengifo’s production.

In this essay, journalist and critic José Ratto-Ciarlo (1904–97) formulates one of the first periodizations of the work of Venezuelan painter César Rengifo (1915–80). He divides the artist’s production into four phases. No specific grounds are given for the definition of the first phase (from 1931 to 1936), though it might be assumed that this was the artist’s formative period, which encompasses his studies at the Academia de Bellas Artes (though he actually enrolled there in 1930) and extends through his departure for Chile in 1936. That first period was marked by erratic production due to his early ties to the political struggles waged by the Frente Popular of Pedro Aguirre Cerda (1938?42). No justification is given for the second phase, which goes from 1936 to 1939, either. Ratto-Ciarlo describes the third phase (1940?50) as a period of reaffirmation of “the national.” In his opinion, the fourth period, which encompasses the entire decade of the sixties, constitutes a recapitulation and synthesis of all his production up to that point. Though the artist’s murals were actually produced before the fourth phase, Ratto-Ciarlo considers them part of that period. Regarding it, he places emphasis on Rengifo’s new impulse to capture the future. Rengifo did not produce any work at all during significant portions of the fourth phase because he was intensely engaged in political struggle. His political activism was evidenced with great drama, though, in works like El hombre que llora por el hombre (oil on canvas, 1969). The Rengifo retrospective was the largest exhibition of his work ever held. Because it included some three hundred works from different periods, Ratto-Ciarlo, the event’s organizer, was able to venture this tentative periodization.

[On César Rengifo’s life and painting, see in the ICAA digital archive the interview by journalist Silvia Coronil “El arte y la política vistos por César Rengifo. En entrevista exclusiva con ‘Tribuna Popular’” (doc. no. 1172426); the interview by Jorge Nunes “César Rengifo: El retorno a las raices” (doc. no. 1101822); and the interview by Irma Valero “César Rengifo: ‘No hay arte sin ideología’” (doc. no. 1141917). See as well Pedro Beroes’s essay “Viva memoria de César Rengifo” (doc. no. 1141854), and José María Salvador’s text “César Rengifo. El drama humano” (doc. no. 1101982). Finally, see the following writings by Rengifo himself: “Tesis del realismo. El arte y nuestro tiempo” (doc. no. 810019); “Del abstraccionismo a un nuevo realismo. Presente y porvenir de la pintura” (doc. no. 1074194); and “Verdades y mentiras del abstraccionismo” (doc. no. 1065758)].