In this historical review, prompted by the exhibition of contemporary Chilean art in Berlin, the artist and teacher Francisco Brugnoli reflects on the “impertinence” of (ethnic-geographical and artistic) otherness as seen from the perspective of the horror inherent in its dismissal when compared to what is considered “suitable.” The author refers to the dynamics of the (unsuitable) history of America, including those of Chilean art, as struggles to occupy spaces considered “empty” that have produced and obliterated examples of otherness, making it difficult, later on, to trace the origin of their critical ruptures and challenges. Brugnoli notes the impertinence of certain artistic developments in the mid-1960s within the hegemonic discourse of Chilean art, works he identifies as forerunners of contemporary practices. He emphatically states that Latin American dictatorships are the first “suitable crisis” in the region and that they open the door to an unprecedented solution that entails both a total revision and the chance to create a new relationship between politics and art.

This essay is one of a number of critical texts that appear in the catalogue for Cirugía Plástica: Conceptos de arte contemporáneo Chile 1980–1989 (Plastic Surgery: Contemporary Art Concepts Chile 1980–1989), the exhibition presented at the Berlin State Art Salon (September 14 to October 18, 1989). The event sought to show—in its entirety—the  Escena de Avanzada (Advanced Scene) of Chilean art produced during the dictatorship (1973–90). A few months after the first free elections in Chile, Francisco Brugnoli gives a great deal of thought to identity and history (or the absence thereof), which are closely intertwined when attempting to determine a point of origin in both an artistic and a geographical and cultural sense.  

This essay also documents the debates and difficulties involved in agreeing on a periodization in the most recent history of Chilean art that would include its ruptures and interruptions, especially in terms of the work of the artists who made up the Escena de Avanzada. This also entails an assessment of how the 1973 military dictatorship impacted the development of art in Chile.  

A visual artist from Santiago, Chile, Francisco Brugnoli (b. 1935) was one of the most important artists in the Chilean art field in the 1960s and 1970s. Critical of traditional painting formats, he introduced the concept of “installation.” His Cadáver Exquisito (Exquisite Corpse) was shown at the homonymous exhibition at the Galería Ojo de Buey (Santiago, Chile, January 1990). The review Un Cenotafio (A Cenotaph) was published the following year in the fourth issue of the magazine of the same name.