El café literario [The Literary Café] (1977-1987) was one of the most influential cultural magazines in Colombia during the 1970s and 1980s. Its editorial board included members such as the writer Gustavo Álvarez Gardeazábal (b. 1945), Danilo Cruz Vélez (1920–2008), and the historians Jaime Duarte French (1921–2003), Abelardo Forero Benavides (1912–2003), and Ramón de Zubiría (1922–1995), among many others.
The XXVII Salón Nacional de Artistas [27th National Artists Salon] (1978), reviewed by Eduardo Márceles Daconte (b. 1942) in this magazine, was especially controversial. A great number of articles, reviews, and critiques of the Salon were published in the press, many of which discussed the value of the prizes awarded by the jury. One of the prizes was awarded to A-la-cena con zapatos [Larder with Shoes] (1978), the installation by the Barranquilla group known as “El Sindicato” [The Union] that was active from 1976 to 1979. The group’s installation consisted of old shoes, found in garbage cans and on the streets of their Caribbean port city, nailed to a wooden larder (used for food storage). After it was rejected in Barranquilla, the installation was exhibited at the Salón Nacional in Bogotá where it was awarded first prize by the jury whose members included Aracy Amaral (b.1930) from Brazil, Waldo Rasmussen, the North American agent associated with MoMA (Museum of Modern Art) in New York, and Santiago Cárdenas (b. 1937). According to Márceles Daconte, this installation “seeks to demystify everything about the Salón (…). It recreates the social and urban decay experienced by the coastal city” of Barranquilla. The second prize was awarded to Ana Mercedes Hoyos for Atmósfera [Atmosphere], a white canvas.
This article, together with those published by the art critic Marta Traba [see, “Una mirada sobre el Salón” [A Look at the Salon], Arte en Colombia [Art in Colombia], # 9, April 1979] and Luis Caballero in the magazines Arte en Colombia and Alternativa [Alternative], are the most interesting versions of the controversy.