Entitled “Artistas y obras en la exposición,” this chapter features the works selected for the Historia, Escenas e Intervalos: Fotografía y Video component of Proyecto Pentágono2000, a research project on contemporary art from Colombia organized by the Dirección de Artes Visuales of the Colombian Ministerio de Cultura.The text is structured around five sections that establish an interchange between the various concepts developed and upheld by Juan Fernando Herrán’s theoretical research. It also devises a joint conception of the selected works to critically analyze the relationship between the document and history in art. The first section, “La historia, la subjetividad y la política,” presents the case of Colombian photographers Benjamín de la Calle and Lino Lara. Though neither man considered himself an artist, both produced portraits and photographic registers of the early 20th century that are sufficiently important on a visual level to merit their inclusion as artists in this show. Herrán compares them to contemporary Colombian artists like Carmenza Estrada and her video How to Make South American Men Quiet and other works of video art based on archival images of important moments in Colombian history, for instance Carga Descarga [Load Unload] by Adriana Arenas and Sinfonía de entropía [Symphony of Entropy] by Andrés Burbano and Fredy Arias. The second section, “Escenas,”discusses staging and installation as components crucial both to the work and to the technical process of its configuration. Herrán mentions specifically the “formal organization of elements” and the use of images of violence in the series Corte de florero [Flower Vase Cut] (1997) by Juan Manuel Echavarría, for instance, and the work Lazos familiares [Family Ties] by Germán Martínez. Both are important points of reference in terms of the use of space and experimentation with technique for the Faenza series by Miguel Ángel Rojas as well as his Guerreros [Warriors] (1987)and Caño Limón (1992); Cortinas de baño [Shower Curtains] by Oscar Muñoz; Con la mirada en el cielo [Looking to the Sky] by Beltrán Obregón; and the videos Belencito Corazón [Belencito Heart] by Juan Fernando Ospina and Reel by Alejandro Mancera. The third section includes works that address the body, such as El Cuerpo: Pornotopía 11 by Carlos Salazar, Top Model # 3 by Clemencia Poveda, and Apetitos de familia [Family Appetites] by Clemencia Echeverri. The fourth section on documentary filmmaking features the works Amparo Amaya and La arepa by Diego García,Oscar Campo, Luis Ospina and Carlos Mayolo. The chapter closes with a section entitled “Ficciones” that addresses works structured on the basis of “visual manipulation and artifice” such as Spejo de agua-Caronte [Reflecting Pool-Charon] by Edgar Quiroz and an analysis of Rodrigo Facundo’s art, as well as videos by Marcelo A. Villada and Gilles Charalambos. The chapter also contains a bibliography of texts on Colombian photography.

This text is important to curatorial memory due to both its theoretical and visual formulation and to its explanatory power regarding the works selected. The event Pentágono was formulated as a response to the debates on history and curatorial method that emerged at the 37th Salón Nacional de Artistas, the last edition of that event held in the 20th century (in 1998). Unlike those salons in which a great many artists participated, the curatorial focus of the Proyecto de Investigaciones sobre arte contemporáneo en Colombia privileged “a space of analysis” that led curators to identify processes and tendencies and to come up with a selection discussed in each of the texts that accompanied the show [see doc. no. 1099666, 1099681, and 1093916]. This text is also important due to Juan Fernando Herrán’s curatorial reflection, which focuses on the document and archive in a strategy for the interpretation of social phenomena and on an exploration of new formulations that enrich artistic practice mostly in the spheres of video and photography. Herrán, a curator, unassumingly affirms the decision to join the figures of the photographer and the artist. This is the case of Benjamín de la Calle, for instance, who is included due to his unique way of arranging bodies to convey transcendent meanings.  

Other important studies on video and photography in Colombia include “Aproximación a una Historia del Videoarte en Colombia” [see doc. no. 1130869] by Gilles Charalambos (b. 1958). His approach revolves around major events, artists, and exhibitions from the late seventies until the year 2000 (available at his website www.Bitio.net/vac). The study features a text by José Ignacio Roca (b. 1962) on the curatorship of Face Value (2002) in which he discusses how the works selected formulate a reflection on the notion of identity [doc. no. 1099516].  

Herrán is a visual artist with a degree from the Universidad de los Andes in Bogotá. Thanks to the “Jóvenes Talentos del Banco de la República” scholarship, he did studies towards a master’s degree in art at Chelsea College of Art in London. Since 1992, his work has been exhibited internationally at biennials as well as group and solo shows