This review by Colombian critic José Hernán Aguilar (b. 1952) attests to and analyzes the aesthetic and conceptual transformations that took place in the work of Carlos Salas Silva (b. 1957) during a crucial period in his production. Aguilar’s insistence on the intellectual nature of Salas Silva’s painting sheds light on a side of his work that he would develop during the nineties when, as part of a group of artists, he would interrogate painting and its installation in space in order to reflect on the limits of the pictorial medium (see A través del espejo, autorrflexión de la pintura (1998), doc. no. 1076656).
Starting in the mid-20th century, abstraction was an important force on the Colombian art scene, specifically in the work of artists such as Marco Ospina (1912–1983), Eduardo Ramírez Villamizar (1923–2004), Judith Márquez (1925–1994), and Édgar Negret (b. 1920). After a complex period of growth from 1960 to 1990, a group of painters emerged—Salas Silva among them—that questioned the limits of painting and, as such, veered away from the formulations of Modernism. In the nineties, artists like Rafael Echeverri (b. 1952) embarked on research into object painting [“Rafael Echeverri”, doc. no. 1129294] concerned with the viewer’s visual perception. From different perspectives, these painters formulated other notions of space.
Carlos Salas Silva has a degree in architecture from the Universidad de los Andes. He studied painting at the École Nationale Superieure de Beaux-Arts in Paris. His work has been featured in a number of exhibitions, among them Por mi raza hablará el espíritu, a Mexico-Colombia artistic exchange at the Museo del Chopo, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM, Mexico City, 1995) based on that university’s motto; and A través del espejo: Autorreflexión de la pintura, organized by the Museo de Arte Moderno of Bogotá (1998). In 1992, he received a grant from the Instituto Colombiano de Cultura (Colcultura) for individual artistic production. At present (2010), he is the director of Galería Mundo.
For further information on Sala Silva, see doc. no. 1132853, doc. no. 1133157, doc. no. 1133804, doc. no. 1134859">1134859, doc. no. 1134859">1134859, and doc. no. 1134646.
José Hernán Aguilar studied art history and audiovisual media at Swarthmore College in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania. He was a member of the advisory board on the visual arts for the Instituto Colombiano de Cultura. A curator, he is the director of the art museum of the Universidad Nacional of Bogotá. He has collaborated with a number of other institutions, among them the Museo de Arte Moderno and the Biblioteca Luis Ángel Arango in Bogotá.
For further information on Aguilar, see doc. no. 1091846, doc. no. 1098946, doc. no. 1098192, and doc. no. 1099156.
