Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

The journalist and future historian of journalism, Agustín Agüeros, undertakes a defense of Mexican artists who have studied in Europe and are now showing their work at the Academia Nacional de Bellas Artes (midyear 1906). Agüeros makes every [...]

In this short article by Antonio Rodríguez, the art critic shows his support for an article published in the previous issue of the journal Espacios by the artist Roberto Berdecio, in defense of “social painting.” Rodríguez believes that “ [...]

Critic Jorge Juan Crespo de la Serna reviews the content of the newly opened Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes at the Palacio de Bellas Artes. After several visits to take in the breadth of the collection, he concludes that the Mexican painting section [...]

In commemoration of the XV anniversary of the weekly magazine Hoy [Today], the Instituto de Bellas Artes (INBA) suggests the periodical publish a selection of images representing local painting throughout the ages. An article written by the critic [...]

The Fine Arts Department of the Secretaría de Educación Pública [SEP, Ministry of Public Education] was the administrative body that grouped Mexican visual artists starting in the mid-1920s. Through this department, artists were linked to official [...]

José Luis Cuevas was in Caracas when he received his invitation to the Bienal Interamericana de Pintura y Grabado [Inter-American Biennial of Painting and Printmaking] and he declined it when he learned of the control exerted by the members of the [...]

Both Jorge Juan Crespo de la Serna and Luis Cardoza y Aragón agreed that the deliberations of the International Jury’s Panel (which had established the parameters for awarding the prizes) for the Bienal Interamericana de Pintura y Grabado [Inter- [...]

Art critic Rosa Castro asked three respected Mexican artists for their opinions on the Bienal Interamericana de Pintura y Grabado [Inter-American Biennial of Painting and Printmaking]. Raúl Anguiano felt that the biennial was the most important [...]

Antonio Rodríguez Luna was invited to sit on the jury of the I Bienal Interamericana de Pintura y Grabado [First Inter-American Biennial of Paintings and Prints] a few days after the exhibition opened. He was picked as the arbiter who would cast the [...]

Jorge González Camarena did not believe that Mexican painting was in decline as asserted by Rufino Tamayo, rather it was in a stage of exploration. However, it should not lose its local and national character, which Camarena believed should be [...]

In this book published in 1937, Frances Toor, the North American promoter based in Mexico, makes a study of the most representative artists of modern Mexican painting. Toor served as editor and author of the introduction, while the painter Carlos Mé [...]

In this essay entitled “The Mexican School,” Laurence E. Schmeckebier analyzes the rise and evolution of the “Mexican School of Painting.” Schmeckebier places the origin of this “school” in the first generation of muralism and in [...]

In this essay, North American critic and art collector MacKinley Helm analyzes the work of those artists whose style and content did not fit into muralism or the so-called “Mexican School of Painting.” Helm discusses, in the context of the 1920s [...]