In 1957, Ricardo Carpani (1930–97), Juan Manuel Sánchez (1930), and Mario Mollari (1930) met to produce paintings with a social content that upheld a revolutionary discourse indebted to both figurative monumentalism and Mexican muralism that were intended for the public. Those involved—Esperilio Bute (1931), Pascual Di Bianco (1930–78), Julia Elena Diz (1928), Carlos Sessano (1935), and Raúl Lara Torres (1940)—had already organized themselves, in 1959, as Movimiento Espartaco. The name revealed an association with Trotskyism, more so than with images from Mexican muralism; however, their national political stances were closer to the Argentinean left wing. Among its members was Ricardo Carpani, who distanced himself from the group two years after it was formed, with the intention of developing a revolutionary artistic thought (he published Arte y revolución en América Latina, [Art and Revolution in Latin America] 1962) or murals and posters produced for the Confederación General del Trabajo de los Argentinos (CGT-A) [General Confederation of Labour of Argentina]. Grupo Espartaco was dissolved in 1968. One of its later members, Italian Franco Venturi (1937–76)—who joined in 1965—was detained during the Argentinean military dictatorship and disappeared in February of 1976.
This document is important for two reasons. First, it established a link between defenders of political art in the 1930s: both the poet and critic Raúl González Tuñón (1905–74) and Grupo Espartaco; secondly, this exhibition corresponded to the core’s consolidation, which would last with total aesthetic homogeneity until 1968, since later on, with Franco Venturi’s involvement, the plastic language was modified toward approaches closer to those of the so-called Otra Figuración [Another Figuration].
