In this document, the Brazilian critic Frederico Morais discusses one of the unflattering traits for which Latin America is becoming known. He refers to the major biennials where there is scant “acknowledgement” of the specifics of regional art and where, as a general rule, “the question of identity” is always an issue. In the cultural sphere he is analyzing, the “identity neurosis” that he detects throughout Latin America is linked to a corresponding economic “dependence neurosis.” This is why Morais endorses Juan Acha’s call for self-awareness on the subject of “plural identity” in Latin America, to be facilitated by means of “theories that can explain the art we produce and promote its development.”    

Frederico [de] Morais (b.1936) is one of the key figures in Brazilian art criticism. He was a newspaper art critic for many years, at Diário de Notícias and at O Globo, both of which were in Rio de Janeiro. He was one of the most active of the “committed” critics of the 1960s and 1970s, having supported a number of avant-garde movements of the period and worked as a curator.

In this document—as in others in which he specifically advocates a “Revisão do método crítico” [doc. no. 1110473]—the author’s intention to take a methodological approach is evident. In this particular case, having noticed an “increased theoretical activity” among some of his colleagues in Latin American countries, Morais defends criticism as a “producer of theories,” and goes as far as to propose the “socialization” of critical activity. Implying no “disparagement of the creative act,” he suggests that reflection about art should focus on the fact that “a work of art exists in a social environment, under the control of society’s means of distribution and consumption.” He goes on to mention the work of art critics such as Raquel Tibol and Ida Rodríguez Prampolini (Mexico), Aldo Pellegrini and Jorge Romero Brest (Argentina), and the Brazilians Mário Pedrosa, Ferreira Gullar, and Aracy Amaral.