In search of an expression that would be authentically Latin American, Alejandro Lora Risco establishes the difference between American culture and reality, the latter referring to the material facts of life on the continent. Reflecting on his experience of the Mexican art show held in Lima in 1954, he affirms that it is impossible to search for the roots of American culture in one’s own land. Land and culture are factors that exist in tension, one which is a function of reality and the other, which is subject to universal spiritual values. For Lora, a people can only express themselves through universal values, the assimilation of which allows them to show themselves to everyone else as “universally understandable, communicative.”

This is the first of two articles relating to the Mexican art exhibition organized by La Crónica newspaper and written by essayist Alejandro Lora Risco on the potential for Latin American artistic expression.

Organized and exhibited in Lima (June 1954) by La Crónica newspaper, the Mexican art exhibition brought the modern art of that country to the local scene. Although it was not the first occasion that works from this country had been shown, the magnitude of this show went beyond any previous exhibitions. Its importance is unquestionable within a context polarized by the debate on abstract art; controversy had erupted the month before, sparked by an exhibition of contemporary Italian painters. That made the discussion of the works from Mexico an even more significant one, accentuated by the frequent parallel drawn between that country and Peru. One of the noteworthy critics of abstract art, writer Sebastián Salazar Bondy (1924-65), devoted two emphatic articles to the value of the Mexican exhibition, holding it up as an example of “national” art that was at the same contemporary. [See in the ICAA digital archive,  “Artes Plásticas (7 de junio de 1954) (doc.no. 1137991) and “Artes Plásticas (9 de junio de 1954)” (doc. no. 1138006), by Bondy].

In response, the principal ideologue of local modernism, architect Luis Miró Quesada Garland (1914-94), rejected the existence of a Mexican “school” by highlighting its debt to European modernism. [See “En blanca y negra...,” by Garland (doc. no. 1138030)]. Nevertheless, the more systematic reflection was made by one of the exhibition’s organizers, essayist and painter Alejandro Lora Risco (1918-2001); he upheld Rufino Tamayo (1899-1991) as an example of “mestizo” artistic expression. For [Lora Risco] [Tamayo’s] worth arose from his ability to strip the “American elements” from any program or anecdote, thus identifying in unison universality and Western culture. [See the articles by Alejandro Lora Risco: “Nuestros artistas presentes…” (doc. no. 1150959); “Hacia la indigenización de nuestro concepto del mundo” (doc. no. 1151010)].