Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

The author, Alfonso Castrillón, discusses a number of conceptual events that took place in Lima in the 1960s and compares them to other more recent ones, including the group exhibition Signo X Signo (1979) and Acción Furtiva (1980), performance [...]

In this essay, the historian Alfonso Castrillón discusses the work of Armando Williams. The author refers to an untitled painting, dated 1981, from his own collection, and learns that it was inspired by a photograph taken in Lima during the National [...]

Alfonso Castrillón weighs in on the controversy that erupted over Motociclista No. 3, the painting by Luis Zevallos Hetzel that won first prize at the Festivales de Ancón (a resort on the outskirts of Lima). The uproar began when the Lima magazine [...]

This introductory essay for the retrospective exhibition 25 años de obra gráfica: Bracamonte was written by the critic Alfonso Castrillón. The event—held at the Galería de Arte de Petróleos del Perú in May 1975—showcased the career of Jos [...]

In this article the art historian Alfonso Castrillón looks back at the debate over the jury’s decision to award the 1975 National Culture Prize for art to Joaquín López Antay, the altarpiece artist from the Andean region of Peru. There is a [...]

In this article the art historian Alfonso Castrillón looks back at the debate over the jury’s decision to award the 1975 National Culture Prize for art to Joaquín López Antay, the altarpiece artist from the Andean region of Peru. Following the [...]

Alfonso Castrillón defends the decision to recognize López Antay by granting him the Premio Nacional de Cultura [award], asserting that his work “is more authentic than the work of many so-called high artists, who have spent their whole lives [...]

This essay presents the basis and verdict of the Premio Nacional de Cultura [National Culture Prize] for art, awarded in 1975 to the Andean altarpiece artist Joaquín López Antay. It is said that in Peru two types of art coexist: one is the so- [...]

In this text, Alfonso Castrillón argues that the conflict between “high art” and “folk art” is a reflection of class division, where the dominant class sets limits for low art by means of notions such as “individual creation” and “ [...]