Puerto Rican artist Antonio Martorell provides a glimpse of the images that come to mind when he remembers Marta Traba when she was living in Puerto Rico. He says that she possessed a “provocative, questioning, and polemical mind committed to defending Latin American art in capital letters, as well as the search for a regional identity with both an open mind and an unyielding and keen sense of discernment.” Martorell says that her stance on what he calls the “empire” (that is, the United States) was what led her to be deported from Puerto Rico when the Universidad de Puerto Rico withdrew its support after having hired her.

By the time Marta Traba (1930–1983) moved to San Juan, Puerto Rico, she had already lived in Bogotá, New York, Paris, and Buenos Aires. From August 1970 until the summer of 1971, she taught classes on Latin American art, the theory of art history (201), the history of modern art (213), and other subjects at the Departamento de Bellas Artes[Department of Fine Arts] of the Río Piedras campus of the Universidad de Puerto Rico. In the summer of 1971, she also offered a course in aesthetics; however, at the end of the summer term, the university did not renew her contract. While living in Puerto Rico, Traba wrote articles for newspapers, magazines, and books in which she formulated her position on Puerto Rican art. Her views were widely questioned and criticized by members of the art milieu. Antonio Martorell (Santurce, b. 1939) was trained at the Taller de Gráfica del Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña [Puerto Rican Cultural Institute Print Workshop] under Lorenzo Homar. During his career, Martorell worked as a theater set and wardrobe designer, poster artist, printmaker, painter, book illustrator, professor, and writer. But, most importantly, he has been a graphic designer. In 1968, he founded the Taller Alacrán [Scorpion Workshop]—a workshop-art school devoted to criticizing Puerto Rican social conditions and politics—and managed it until 1971. In 1974 he was among the prize-winning artists at the III Bienal de San Juan del Grabado Latinoamericano [3rd San Juan Biennial of Latin American Prints]. Two years later, on the eve of the 4th Biennial he resigned from the jury because he was opposed to using funds from the United States bicentenary to finance the event. Multiple protests led to the cancellation of the 4th Biennial in 1976, and the event did not take place until 1979. Martorell was honored with a retrospective exhibition at the 7th Biennial in 1986. A year earlier the FBI raided his home as part of an attempt to arrest presumed members of Los Macheteros [the Machete Wielders], an underground revolutionary group that worked tirelessly to promote Puerto Rican independence.