Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

Oswald de Andrade explains that the term Pau-Brasil [Brazil Tree, which yielded the wood that was exploited for export and gave the country its name] that he used in his 1924 manifesto was intended as a “slogan,” an invention with which [...]

According to Frederico Morais, the emergence of audiovisual work in several exhibition halls was linked to the introduction of the “object” category that freed up other more traditional categories. In his opinion, “the object” implied a [...]

In this article, the writer Ronald de Carvalho questions the undeniable presence of foreign styles in the decorative art to be seen in the city of Rio de Janeiro, and suggests using ornamental motifs inspired by Brazilian flora and fauna and native [...]

In this text, experimental artist Abraham Palatnik discusses the questions of information and technology in relation to human evolution. In Palatnik’s view, evolution is key to the dynamic of culture as man adapts to the world at large and to his [...]

Playwright Augusto Boal declares that all the stories contained within his book are true, and were written based on testimony overheard during different trips that occurred after he left Brazil in 1971, during the height of the military dictatorship [...]

Artist Regina Silveira introduces the installation In Absentia (M. D.), which refers to the graphic manipulation of the codes of representation in perspective. Silveira makes use of this in constructing and mounting her “imitations” of absent [...]

In this letter to the painter Tarsila do Amaral, the writer Mário de Andrade urges her, Sérgio Milliet, and Oswald de Andrade—the “country folk” who have become futurists during their stay in Paris—to return to the “virgin jungle,” to [...]

In this letter to fellow Brazilian Joaquim Inojosa (in Recife), the well-known poet Manuel [Carneiro de Sousa] Bandeira [Filho] (1886–1968) provides brief news about the modernist movement (then in full swing) in São Paulo. He emphasizes the “ [...]

This [document] by Mário de Andrade is a reply, dated May 20, 1928, to the letter in which Augusto Meyer discussed the former’s controversial activity, conscience, and references to national subject matter. De Andrade outlines his intellectual [...]

Writer Clóvis Gusmão writes to Joaquim Inojosa about the Movimiento Antropofágico and takes the opportunity to clarify some parts of its agenda. Its principles include: the idea of establishing distance from European civilization by creating new [...]

In this letter addressed to Professor Walter Zanini—the then director of the MAC-USP (Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo)—Gabriel Borba reveals his intention to work with phenomena that present themselves to an artist who [...]

Olívio Tavares de Araújo introduces an exhibition of the work of Farnese de Andrade, an artist then known in Rio, but not in São Paulo. The writer brings up the strange nature of this artist from Minas Gerais, under the label of “mineiridad.” [...]

In the judgment of the author, Mário Pedrosa, Brasilia is not “a synthesis of the arts,” it is a simple promise. For him, synthesis cannot be achieved through occasional collaborations but rather through a prominent practice that creates a “ [...]

In an article written in 1951 entitled “Depoimento de um arquiteto carioca” [Testimony of an Architect from Rio de Janeiro], Lúcio Costa describes Le Corbusier’s visit to Brazil in 1929, his plan for the city’s urban layout, and what he [...]

The catalogue for I Salão, the exhibition sponsored by the Feira de Indústrias, includes essays written by the organizers of the event: Elias Chaves Neto, Vittorio Gobbis, and Quirino da Silva. Gobbis talks about the meaning of art and [...]

This text is the monthly bulletin of the Sociedade Pro Arte which includes the list for the catalogue of works presented at the III Salão da Pro Arte, a few of which it reproduces within. The following artists participated in the exhibition: Alberto [...]

In this essay, the Spanish artist Julio Plaza, who lives in Brazil, discusses the differences between “the work” and the “discourse about the work.” He concentrates on the links between the verbal and the nonverbal, which [...]

Flávio de Carvalho proposes that, in the twentieth century, man’s dwelling be transformed in response to a new reality. In de Carvalho’s view, man spends most of the day in the urban universe—that is his primary dwelling—and hence it should [...]

This speech by Mário Pedrosa regards the city of Brasilia, which he examines as a work of collective art, believing it presents an experimental and practical problem. He defends the connection it represents between utopia and planning, a profound ( [...]

This article, published on the last day of the Exposição de Pintura Moderna Anita Malfatti, remarks on the “crowd of onlookers” that had visited the exhibition. The author notes that this painter’s work is as personal as it is modern, and [...]

In this article, Luciano Gusmão writes at length about Lótus Lobo’s prints and her ideas for a “caipira” [rancher] style of aesthetic nationalism based on an approach that is very closely related to Pop Art. Her work presents a variety of [...]

In this text, Tadeu Chiarelli examines the meaning of printmaking in contemporary art. It adds nothing on a technical level, he argues, and—as the medium used for the reproduction of images in post-industrial society—it is brought into the sphere [...]

João [or Hans] Koranyi suggests that photography should be thought of in terms of its cultural mission rather than whether it is or is not “art.” In a world where nations are at odds with each other, photography reveals the absence of [...]

In this article, Meyer Schapiro asks a number of questions about the arts, as follows: Why is it rare to find painting and sculpture incorporated into modern architecture? Is it because of the autonomy of the arts? Is it possible to get architects [...]

In this text, architect and set designer Flávio Império asserts that new painting, characterized by direct and shameless objectivity due to a consumerist middle class, has broken with the subjectivities of Informalism and of Tachisme. He argues [...]

The writer Monteiro Lobato serves up a conservative review of the Exposição de Pintura Moderna — Anita Malfatti in a heated attack on avant-garde art, describing the exhibition as being, in his opinion, the work of “people who see things [...]

In this communiqué-style essay written in Rio de Janeiro, Oswald de Andrade calls for the axiological rehabilitation of primitive man—understood as the communities or people that lived on this continent before the Eurocentrically-named & [...]

The Brazilian artist Regina Silveira introduces the exhibition of her own works, entitled Anamorfas: um estudo sobre as aparências representadas pelos códigos projetivos. She created these works that deal with codes and seemingly simple [...]

Antonio Gonçalves Filho comments on the exhibition of photographs by Anna Mariani, included in the XVIII São Paulo Biennial. Although it portrays simple images of houses common in the northeastern region of Brazil, the shots awaken a curiosity [...]

These paintings by Antonio Henrique Amaral are introduced in this text by Olívio Tavares de Araújo, who calls into question the terms “realism” and/or “hyperrealism” used to describe the artist’s work. In the writer’s opinion, these [...]

According to the author of this text, Mário Pedrosa, at the onset of the modern architecture movement restriction to the strictly functional was necessary in order to combat the aesthetic or visual approach that predominated in others styles and in [...]

In this text, Sérgio Romagnolo expresses the need for a “unique vision” in order to understand Brazilian art. He believes that Brazilian artists should not be seen from a European perspective and maintains that it is still possible to develop [...]

Theorist Gillo Dorfles underscores his belief that cities could emerge from industrial production that included everything from domestic gadgets to buildings. In his judgment, the industrial aesthetic plays an important role in the formation of [...]

Arlindo Machado’s point of departure in this text is that noise, rather than signals, is the basis of writing in video. Grids of lines and dots are laid out on a surface, but when an electrical current is applied the figures are manipulated and [...]

The manifesto that launched Rex Gallery & Sons in the city of São Paulo addresses in passing issues facing the visual arts in Brazil such as the paucity of galleries that support the production of artists, the lack of specialized art criticism, [...]

This account of the disbandment of the Grupo Rex asserts that the primordial aim of the São Paulo-based group was to say things that had never been said before, to criticize attitudes beset with bad faith, and to encourage the work of young [...]

This article is an attempt to address what is known as “Realismo Mágico” [Magic Realism], which the author asserts, is not a movement, school, or philosophy, but quite simply “Rex”—that is, the artist Wesley Duke Lee, his character “ [...]

Mário de Andrade begins this text by questioning the term “architecture” and its meaning. In his view, architectural laws obey both the laws of nature and the laws of humans that lead to arbitrary personal impulses. He establishes a difference [...]

This is an interview with Julio Plaza where he revealed his personal views about art, stating that he considered it a cultural product, as he did not believe it had the capability to universally please all audiences and social groups. He commented on [...]

Julio Plaza introduces his exhibition Câmara Obscura, fully aware of the risks involved in translating a visual language into words. The result is a prim illustration that spills over into the spectators’ terrain. This work is a [...]

Set designer Flávio Império explains that his search for balance ensues between chance and unpredictability. In his view, the “dried meat” banners form part of that process. He recounts how he found those stained pieces of fabric (manufacturing [...]

Mário de Andrade addresses this open letter to the writer Alberto de Oliveira, and in principle, defends the literature produced by Brazilian Romanticism, a group associated with a primitive approach to art combined with social, religious, sexual, [...]

According to Carlos Scarinci, the poetics of Cláudio Mubarac’s prints create a conflict between surface and depth; he refuses to treat paper as a simple support or to use it in an iconographic or formal way. Scarinci believes that the cut made to [...]

In addition to organizing and introducing a retrospective exhibition of the work of Alfredo Volpi, Olívio Tavares de Araújo discusses the focus of that show. The exhibition included works with a range of color variations on the same formal design, [...]

In this text, Luciano Gusmão explains that artist Lotus Lobo poetically develops a form that alters an image’s original information by reproducing a selected module on its surface. The information is conveyed by a support and by the meaning of the [...]

The Brazilian art critic Frederico Morais comments on the works sent by the São Paulo artist Nelson Leirner to the Salão de Brasília, and discusses the latter’s reaction to the jury’s decisions. In his reply to Leirner, Morais suggests that [...]

Tadeu Chiarelli sees “the quote” as one of the defining features of contemporary art, taken from visual systems and inspired by a vast array of images and preexisting artistic procedures. He scours his sources, noting the role played by [...]

In this text, Mário Pedrosa reflects on the artist’s place in the life of society, explaining the shift from autonomous producer of crafts to producer of new cultural objects for consumption. He underscores the end of styles, which have been [...]

In this text, Mário Pedrosa remarks on the crisis different art forms are experiencing, a topic that surfaced in the debates at the “Congresso dos Críticos” in 1959. In Pedrosa’s view, the only disciplines deeply affected by that crisis are [...]

According to Mário Pedrosa contemporary art is characterized by “objectivism” or by a rejection of self-expression. In this essay he refers to the symbolic objects suggested by Salvador Dalí and to “the crisis of the object” identified in [...]