Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

In his introduction, Juan E. Ríos—the author of this overview of Peruvian painting from the first half of the twentieth century—describes Peruvian art as “the creation of a visual equivalent of reality, rather than a mere copy of it” denying [...]

Sarcastic praise offered by Juan Ríos for the IAC (Instituto de Arte Contemporáneo) given the institution’s defense of the prologue authored by critic Juan Acha for the catalogue for the Exposición Homenaje for painter Sérvulo Gutiérrez, [...]

The author, Juan Ríos, responds to the statement released by the IAC regarding the controversy generated by the opinions offered by critic Juan Acha in the catalogue for the Exposición Homenaje for Sérvulo Gutiérrez. Ríos believes it is “too [...]

Author Juan Ríos continues his exchange of open letters by responding the publication of a letter in El Comercio (Lima, October 19, 1961), wherein Juan Acha defends himself against the accusation that he showed disrespect to Sérvulo Gutiérrez in [...]

Author Juan Ríos responds to the letter published by El Comercio wherein Juan Acha responded to the first letter Ríos had sent to protest Acha’s assessment in the prologue to the catalogue for the Exposición Homenaje for Sérvulo Gutiérrez, [...]

Although Juan Ríos recognizes in this open letter to El Comercio the right people have to give their opinion “on the work of any artist, living or dead,” he believes that “unless the painter requests otherwise, then the prologue of a catalogue [...]

Writer Juan Ríos offers a brief biography of Sérvulo Gutiérrez based on the memories of their first encounter in Paris (1938): “he gave the impression of a force of nature encased in a slight and high-strung body of a man;” he highlights the [...]

In his response to the article published by the Agrupación Espacio, writer and critic Juan Ríos asserts that there are two positions in art today: “art for art’s sake” and socially committed art. He considers abstraction the extreme of the [...]

In this essay Juan Ríos discusses De Manet a nuestros días, the exhibition of French painting organized by the Municipalidad de Lima in the early 1950s. His review summarizes the origins of modern French art, taking Manet’s work as its focal [...]

In this text, writer Juan Ríos remarks on the Surrealist exhibition held at the Galería de Lima in July 1954. In his view, Surrealism is outdated. Initially an iconoclastic movement, it has, over the course of several decades that witnessed a [...]

Juan Ríos asserts that Fernando de Szyszlo’s provocative statement “there are no painters in Peru” serves to legitimize public disdain for the country’s own culture. He condemns what he deems “the dangerous melodrama” that leads to [...]