According to the author of this article José Sabogal is, above all, “someone who expresses Peruvian-ness,” one who has not only developed an original technique, but has also managed to expose profound and unprecedented aspects of the country’s soul. When looking at his paintings, “eyes that have not been corrupted by academic prejudice […] will immediately be won over by an irrepressible surge of life,” courtesy of the artist’s expressive nature. Therefore, in Arturo Sabroso’s opinion, this artist belongs to a family of promoters of Peruvian identity. In reference to the works at the exhibition, Sabroso notes that figures and scenes are not presented as pictorial motifs but as synthetic, stylized presences of people or racial customs. He calls Sabogal the “first Peruvian painter,” who has started a new period in Peruvian painting that has nothing to do with exotic themes or European trends. The author also sees in Sabogal’s painting the beginning of a movement that expresses new facets of the Peruvian soul, and that will no doubt spawn offshoots of many different kinds.     

This article by Arturo Sabroso, editor in chief of the newspaper La Tribuna, was written on the occasion of the exhibition of works by José Sabogal, the founder of Peruvian indigenist painting, at the Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos in Lima (1931).

In 1931, Sabogal exhibited twenty paintings at the Salón de Grados at the Facultad de Ciencias Económicas (the former location of the Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos). He had produced these paintings during the 1920s, and many of them were shown at his great exhibition in Buenos Aires in 1928, including several emblematic Indigenist canvases, such as El Varayoc de Chinchero, La procesión del Taytacha Temblores, and El gamonal.

This article appeared, on the occasion of Sabogal’s exhibition, in La Tribuna, the official journal of APRA (Alianza Popular Revolucionaria Americana) [American Popular Revolutionary Alliance], the political party founded by Víctor Raúl Haya de la Torre (1895–1979). The article is from the organization’s most radical period (from 1930 to 1939), during its calls for an anti-imperialist, anti-oligarchic revolution that would take the government of Peru out of the hands of the bourgeoisie and, inspired by a socialist agenda, put the middle classes in charge of improving the lot of the working class. The author of this article, Arturo Sabroso, was an important leader of the APRA movement.