Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

In the Montevidean press, the controversy between the writer Juan Carlos Somma and the art critic Fernando García Esteban developed and was published in installments. It revolved around the governmental and private decisions that were made in [...]

This article by Fernando García Esteban appeared in the weekly journal Marcha and is part of a controversy with the writer Juan Carlos Somma. All in all, the critic’s rant revealed behavior and decisions, both governmental and private, when he was [...]

In his series of four articles, José Cúneo challenges Joaquín Torres García for having submitted to the VIII Salón Nacional de Bellas Artes—where he won the Grand Prize—a painting that, in the author’s view, has nothing to do with his [...]

In this essay, the author, Carlos Herrera Mac Lean outlined a response to the article written by Joaquín Torres García against him, culminating this third section on the brief public controversy between both of them. The response, in a written [...]

In response to the article published in the newspaper El Día by Carlos Herrera Mac-Lean (October 13, 1944), Joaquín Torres García published in the weekly magazine Marcha a particularly harsh response, especially, if one considered that the emitted [...]

In the 1930s the ideological frictions sparked in intellectual circles by the dictatorial government of Gabriel Terra were not just a local problem; they were a reflection of the global conflict presaged by the unstoppable advance of fascism, the [...]

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 [...]

Well-known writer Sebastián Salazar Bondy states that, as in the case of Sérvulo Gutiérrez, there are lives and works “that stimulate debate, that appear destined to be fought over even after they have come to an end.” Regardless of the [...]

This document is a letter by Felipe Buendía to the Lima magazine Caretas in response to the commentary on a previous letter of his. The writer and journalist states that he was branded as “resentful of society” based on his previous letter. He [...]

Founded in 1947, the Galería de Lima, gave rise to the Instituto de Arte Contemporáneo (IAC) eight years later. After its inception, the IAC was key in revitalizing the local scene with international modernism through exhibitions by foreign and [...]

This newspaper article reports on the roundtable discussion about Motocicleta No. 3, by Luis Zevallos Hetzel, which took first prize at the painting competition organized by the Festivales de Ancón (a resort on the outskirts of Lima). The forum took [...]

This is a brief selection of the opinions expressed by critics and artists at a round-table discussion about the jury’s controversial decision to award the first prize for painting to Motociclista No. 3, the work submitted by Luis Zevallos Hetzel [...]

This brief article discusses the exhibition of paintings by Miguel Ángel Cuadros at the Art Center gallery in Miraflores, Lima. The artist was asked for his opinions about the controversial reaction to Motociclista No 3, the painting by Luis [...]

This brief anonymous article addresses the debate on the subject of Motociclista No. 3, by Luis Zevallos Hetzel, winner of the first prize at the painting competition organized by the Festivales de Ancón (a resort on the outskirts of Lima). The [...]

This is a protest against the “un-hierarchic” inclusion of Túpac Amaru II in the Monumento a los Próceres y Precursores de la Independencia del Perú [Monument to the Heroes and Harbingers of Peruvian Independence], by the Peruvian sculptor [...]

This article from El Comercio, a Cuzco newspaper, refers to the competition organized to choose a sculpture to honor Túpac Amaru II to be placed in Cuzco’s Plaza de Armas, and reports that the winning design had been rejected. The correspondent [...]

This text is essayist Sebastián Salazar Bondy’s response to the ironic comments that architect Luis Miró Quesada Garland published in “En blanca y negra,” his column in the Lima-based newspaper El Comercio, on July 25, 1954. In his text, Mir [...]

Contrary to the arguments put forth by opponents of “non-figurative” painting, this article maintains that a country’s degree of cultural evolution is in no way tied to its adherence or lack of adherence to a given artistic tendency. While, the [...]

In this article Francisco Miró Quesada Cantuarias replies to the comments made by Luis Miró Quesada Garland (El Comercio, Lima, August 14, 1955) as part of the debate prompted by the latter’s conclusions concerning the newspaper’s survey about [...]

This newspaper article discusses the opposing points of view expressed by Peruvian artists in the debate over the 1975 National Culture Prize. Speaking in favor of the decision, Ciro Palacios states that the award acknowledges “an urgent need to re [...]

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 [...]

In this article the artist Félix Oliva reviews the debate sparked by 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 latter’s [...]

In this interview the painter Leslie Lee discusses the reasons behind the founding of SUTAP (Sindicato Único de Trabajadores en las Artes Plásticas) [Sole Visual Arts Workers Union], explaining the group’s disagreements and subsequent break with [...]

For the second time, the writer and journalist Luis Freire weighs in on the debate sparked by 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. In [...]

This is the journalist Juan Gargurevich’s second article about the debate sparked by the decision to award the 1975 National Culture Prize for art to Joaquín López Antay, the altarpiece artist from the Andean region of Peru. Gargurevich supports [...]

This is the founding statute, filed in Lima, Peru, of SUTAP (Sindicato Único de Trabajadores en las Artes Plásticas) [Sole Visual Arts Workers Union], an organization devoted to the recognition of the social function of art. The document states [...]

In this article the visual artist Carlos Bernasconi discusses the meaning of the terms “art,” “traditional art,” and “handcrafts” based on the definitions agreed upon at the 1st World Congress of Craftsmen held in New York in 1964. Noting [...]

In this text, Mirko Lauer (under the pseudonym “N. O. Sengai”) points out that only artists and intellectuals, not artisans, have participated in the debate around granting the Premio Nacional [award] to López Antay. He argues that that is due [...]

In this text, critic Jorge Bernuy points out that the decision to grant the Premio Nacional [award] to an altarpiece maker is unprecedented in Peru. He agrees that it is necessary to consider craftsmanship a cultural expression of the people, [...]

This newspaper article includes the full text of the communiqué from the ASPAP (Asociación Peruana de Artistas Plásticos) [Peruvian Association of Visual Artists] in which the association’s board of directors expresses its “radical [...]

This is a report on the visit of the Andean altarpiece artist Joaquín López Antay—the winner of the 1975 National Culture Prize in the art category—to the INC (Instituto Nacional de Cultura). The report includes his statements as well as those [...]

Francisco Moncloa applauds the decision to honor Joaquín López Antay, the Andean altarpiece artist who was awarded the National Culture Prize in the art category in 1975. Moncloa responds to critics who value “cultured art” above “handcrafts [...]

This article, published in the newspaper La Crónica (Lima, 27 December 1975), quotes the opinions expressed by a group of artists shortly after the announcement that Joaquín López Antay, the altarpiece artist from the Andean region of Peru, had [...]

From his perspective as a historian and critic, Germán Rubiano Caballero voices his opposition to the remarks in the press regarding the XIX edition of the Salón Nacional de Artistas held in 1967. In the article entitled “Crítica destructiva [...]

This document is the second letter sent by Juan Acha to Edgardo Pérez Luna, art critic for Lima-based El Comercio newspaper, where he defends the pertinence of his prologue to the catalogue to Exposición Homenaje, an exhibition in honor of painter [...]

This document is the first letter that Juan Acha sent to Edgardo Pérez Luna, art critic for Lima-based newspaper El Comercio. In it, Acha defends the text he wrote for the catalogue to the Sérvulo Gutiérrez retrospective, explaining that— [...]

In this article, Alejandro Otero [Rodríguez] discusses the accusations that the realist painter Pedro León Castro made in 1949 against young artists living in Paris, himself included. Among other things, León Castro accuses them of having “weak [...]

This chapter gathers texts in which the Colombian ecclesiastical authorities established their position with respect to Carlos Correa’s painting, La Anunciación [The Annunciation] (1941)—painting withdrawn from the II Salón Anual de Artistas [...]

This document is Edgar Negret’s response to the press release from the Ministry of Public Works in which he set forth points related to the controversy generated about Abstract art in Colombia based on the monument to Bolívar, a sculpture the [...]

The sculptor, Edgar Negret, refuted the statements made by a group of historians from the Academia Colombiana de Historia [Colombian History Academy], led by Germán Arciniegas, on the Monument to Bolívar commissioned for the celebration of the [...]

Colombian painter Ignacio Gómez Jaramillo was awarded first prize at the First Salón Anual de Artistas Colombianos held in 1940. In this incendiary text, painter Eladio Vélez—who had previously been embroiled in a heated debate with Pedro Nel G [...]

This document is the announcement of the Dante Alighieri prize, organized by the Italian Embassy in Colombia. In the painting category, the winner was the Colombian artist Bernardo Salcedo, with a nonpictorial work. This press release describes the [...]

This press release, written by the Minster of Public Works and Transportation (1980) Enrique Vargas Ramírez, was distributed to the Colombian media on the occasion of the controversy concerning the monument commissioned from the sculptor Édgar [...]

This text is a report submitted to the Archbishop of Bogotá in 1942. It was prepared by three priests sent to visit the III Salón Nacional de Artistas held at the Biblioteca Nacional in Bogotá and to report on the painting Anunciación [ [...]

In this article, poet Maximiliano Grillo voices his opposition to editor and critic Baldomero Sanín Cano in relation to the work of artist Andrés de Santamaría. Sanín Cano’s views were put forth in articles entitled “El impresionismo en Bogot [...]

This press packet is a collection of twenty-nine articles from local and national publications and press releases from Chicago artists’ organizations that convey the controversy surrounding The Chicago Show. Meant as a blind-juried art exhibition, [...]

This critique is about the publication of a pamphlet printed at the UCV (Universidad Central de Venezuela), whose content dealt with “aberrant deviations of eroticism.” The anonymous article states that the pamphlet caused outrage toward the [...]

This article, entitled “Análisis de la obra de Feliza Burstyn” [Analysis of Feliza Burstyn’s Work], was published on September 25, 1974 in the Cali-based newspaper El País. It is one of the responses to art critic and historian Álvaro Medina [...]

Lorenzo Homar harshly criticizes Luigi Marrozzini, director of the Galería Colibrí in Old San Juan, for certain statements in Revista Avance. Homar asserts that Marrozzini was not the founder of the Galería Colibrí or the Bienal de San Juan de [...]

This article by Carolina Ponce de León was published in the Colombian daily newspaper El Tiempo in response to the controversy surrounding the Segunda Bienal de Arte [Second Art Biennial] of the Museo de Arte Moderno [Museum of Modern Art] of Bogot [...]