Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

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 [...]

“Testimonio: El intelectual de izquierda y cierta estética revolucionaria” the editorial published in issue Nº 7 (April–May, 1960) of Revista Sardio (Caracas, 1958–61) analyzes and compares the validity and authenticity of commitment in the [...]

This interview conducted by Irma Valero begins by highlighting aspects of the work of Venezuelan artist César Rengifo. In referring to his Amalivaca mural, the work entitled Nacimiento de América located in the Diego Ibarra Plaza in the Caracas [...]

In this essay Mirko Lauer discusses two approaches to the contemporary interpretation of the visual arts during the pre-capitalist period. Lauer uses the latest ideological definition of creative expression as an umbrella term under which he includes [...]

In the prologue to the book Anotaciones políticas sobre la pintura colombiana (1975), artist Clemencia Lucena questions the culture of a country like Colombia, a culture that, in her view, is imposed by the landowning and bourgeois classes. She [...]

In this text, Helouise Costa analyzes articles on indigenous questions published in the magazine O Cruzeiro from 1943 to 1954, a question she then brings to bear on the medium of photojournalism. Following the use and manipulation of images and of [...]

This essay sets out to analyze the evolution of Brazilian intellectual thought from the 1930s to the mid-1970s in order to identify the distinguishing traits of the transition from an aristocratic view of culture (the target of Mário de Andrade’s [...]

In this interview with Armando J. Florez, Jacobo Borges states that an artist should have a global perspective when it comes to politics and mankind’s real values, and should be free of any limitations imposed by ideologies. The painter believes [...]

Painter Bertha Husband takes it for granted that Puerto Rican artist Elizam Escobar analyzes the ideas and images to be developed in his work in advance. However, it is pointless to give explanations or make judgments on the works [based on those [...]

This article reports on painter Rosendo Salazar’s show at the Galería de Arte Moderno, under the authority of the Dirección General de Acción Educativa del Departmento del Distrito Federal (DDF) [Directorate for Educational Action at the Mexico [...]

The text by Julio Le Parc takes as its starting point the need to overcome individualistic ideas in order to be able to suggest future expansions. Thus, he introduces the idea with a series of questions, which, at first, refer to the general [...]

This written testimonial expresses the reasons why a group of residents and nonresidents took over the Pabellón Argentino de la Ciudad Universitaria de París [Argentinean Building of the University Boarding Complex of Paris] in 1968. It denounces [...]

The text discusses the work method of the Grupo de los Trece [Group of Thirteen] in relation to its constitution. As the coordinator of the group, David Cooper analyzes, on the one hand, the internal problems of the group, “las ansiedades de cada [...]

Jorge Glusberg defines the artist as a modeler of everyday reality, as the “creador de nuevos entornos” [“creator of new environments”], as the “humanizador de la geometría” [“humanizer of geometry”], as “responsible por la [...]

Through different authors, Jorge Glusberg defines the concept of ideology in order to relate it to the reality of Latin American art: “En los países ideológicamente sometidos por las metrópolis y económicamente [...]

This introductory text for Guilio Carlo Argan’s exhibition analyzes the relationship between ideology and technique in order to inquire into the position and destiny of art within that context of ideas. Keeping in mind the self-directed nature and [...]

The text presented by Juan Pablo Renzi at the Primer Encuentro Nacional de Arte de Vanguardia [First National Encounter of Vanguard Art] is defined as an “attempt to bring about the grounds for the proposed agenda” and presents a framework for [...]

As part of his submission to the Arte de Sistemas II [Systems Art II] exhibition, the German artist Joseph Beuys provided a plastic bag which was sometimes used as the catalogue’s “wrapper.” Beuys used graphics on both sides of the [...]

This text suggests that although there is no “Latin American art” as such — that is, art produced by Latin American nations — these countries certainly share a number of “common problems” in terms of the social and political reality of [...]

While visiting Argentina, Mexican painter David Alfaro Siqueiros forms his opinions about Argentinean culture from an ideological split. In his view there are two columns that he calls, in general: the aristocratic and the red one, defined by their [...]