Gustavo Buntinx interviews Claudia Polar, the director of the Galería Forum in Lima. They talk about the development of a market for young Peruvian art, which the gallery has been supporting since 1974. They discuss the changes in the local art scene—more galleries and media coverage of events—and talk about the 1980s: “they were ours in the sense that we identified the ones who are stars today.” Claudia Polar explains her gallery’s commercial and aesthetic policies, agreeing with Buntinx that sales increased at the end of the General Juan Velasco Alvarado (1975) administration, although the real high point came after General Francisco Morales Bermúdez (1975–80) became president, as a result of the new governmental austerity programs. “Given the lack of imports and the availability of money, there were those who came to see art as an investment that at least kept their money from losing its value.” Gallery visitors were now mainly “young” (professionals, artists, students). These were the new buyers, who were replacing traditional collectors. Polar mentions young artists and notes the case of Ramiro Llona (who lives in New York) as an example of the policy of support for young artists that Forum has embraced ever since it was founded. According to Polar, in recent years “gallery attendance has increased, people have learned to see, to visit, to move. But we are still, essentially, a province.”

Gustavo Buntinx (b. 1957), the critic, art historian, and freelance curator, has produced exhibitions and published his writings in several countries. His work mainly addresses contemporary matters and subjects related to colonial and republican visual art. He is the head of the Micromuseo project (there’s room in the back). His professional role involves exploring the relationships between art and violence, art and politics, and art and religion. In the 1980s, he published widely in the Peruvian media, signing his critical articles with the pseudonym “Sebastián Gris.”

This interview addresses the commercial aspect of Peruvian art in the 1970s and early 1980s. It appeared in the eighteenth issue of Hueso Húmero, a magazine that was wholly devoted to Peruvian art produced during the period 1960 to 1980 and included numerous contributions from a variety of specialists, critics, and theorists. This “arts and letters magazine” was one of the most influential publications in Peru due to its extensive coverage of artistic and literary works and criticism. According to the author, the date mentioned in the document––1983––is at odds with the facts concerning the eighteenth issue of Hueso Húmero. Number eighteen was in fact published a year later (1984), as shown by references in the magazine articles to situations that took place after July to September 1983. 

[See other articles by Gustavo Buntinx (pseud.: Sebastián Gris) in the ICAA digital archive: “¿Entre lo popular y lo moderno? Alternativas pretendidas o reales en la joven plástica peruana” (doc. no. 1143012) and “Está naciendo algo... una entrevista con Mirko Lauer” (doc. no. 1136477)].