This document records the establishment of the first modern initiative created in Colombia to teach fine arts. The objective was to establish one single institution to teach the appropriate subjects to the political, financial, and social elite of the period. By the early twentieth century these subjects would evolve into traditional specializations, such as architecture, painting, music, and printmaking. At that time, drawing was considered a major subject in its own right; of course, in the future it would become a subordinate field.
The Institute (INBA) project included the schools that were already operating in Bogotá, and would be financed with public funds. These schools were separate from any institutional system or Master of Arts program. According to the document, the Institute would include the Escuela de Dibujo y Grabado [School of Drawing and Printmaking] founded by General Alberto Urdaneta (1845–1987) and the Spanish printmaker Antonio Rodríguez, who specialized in the medium of woodcut; the Escuela Vásquez [Vásquez School] (that was started in 1873 at the school named Vásquez) directed by the Mexican artist Felipe Santiago Gutiérrez; the Escuela Arrubla de Arquitectura [Arrubla School of Architecture] that joined forces with the academic initiative installed by the Italian architect Pietro Cantini (1847–1892) in unfinished premises in the National Capitol; and finally, the Escuela Guarín de Música [Guarín School of Music], which would be part of the Academia Nacional de Música [National Academy of Music] directed by Jorge W. Price, which had only just been founded.
Graduates were expected to receive government grants that would allow them to perfect their art in Europe; on their return they were expected to show their appreciation by working for a period of time on government projects of various kinds. In practice, this project never quite materialized and the schools involved struggled on independently. The plan did not come to fruition until four years later, during President Rafael Núñez’s term (1880–86), when his administration proposed the idea of developing a Colombian form of art that would express the symbols of the new national goals. This initiative in turn prompted the need to provide a measure of professional status for Colombian artists, something that had never before been done.