Artists such as Ronald Kay (the theoretical voice) and Eugenio Dittborn (the visual approach) were among the first to define what, exactly, was understood in the 1980s to be Latin American––and specifically Chilean––photography. The book Del Espacio de Acá; señales para una mirada americana (About this Space: Signs for an American Viewpoint), which focused on Dittborn’s work, was published in 1980 with the help of Editores Asociados. A year later Dittborn self-published Fallo fotográfico (Photo Finish, see the ICAA Digital Archive doc. no. 729801) in a run of forty-seven copies. These books provide insight into the establishment and socialization of a relatively unknown problem at the time regarding avant-garde questions at both a Latin American and an international level, including the issue of technical reproduction, the aura of a photograph, and an interest in capturing reality and/or the concept of a documentary. Both books are of interest because of their consideration of generic and theoretical problems and the significance of addressing these problems at a local level and scale. They suggest an analogy: a form of reproduction that leads to the establishment of a symbolic framework for subjugation at the hands of the colonizer. Both Kay and Dittborn prompt us to ask ourselves what imaginaries we capture and reproduce. In Caja de Herramientas (Toolbox), in particular, we can discern a kind of writing that indirectly affects the Chilean art scene, relating to the connection between the usual duo of meaning and signifier.
The text includes a note of thanks to Froilán Hupat, Jack Ceitelis (from Kodaliths), and Luis Oviedo (from Estudios Norte), members of the creative network with whom Dittborn worked.
