Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

This newsletter’s main goal is to present instructions and suggestions for the shipment of works scheduled to be shown at the Art Systems exhibition in São Paulo, Brazil, from September to November, 1971, which ultimately did not happen [...]

This excerpt from the landmark text, Antiestética, was penned by Argentine artist and author Luis Felipe Noé. This work famously problematized the polarizing relationship between nationalist and avant-garde art movements in Latin [...]

This article is based on a conversation with Carlos Cruz-Diez after he was awarded the Officier des Arts et des Lettres, a prize sponsored by the French government, which was presented by the French Minister of Culture, Jack Lange. In it it appears [...]

The Argentinean professor Damián Bayón reviews Frente a la máquina, the exhibition presented at the Maison de L’Amérique Latine. He reports that there are plans to organize regular exhibitions of works by Latin [...]

In this article Ariel Jiménez reviews concepts that were widely discussed in Venezuela at that time: realist art and abstract art, two irreconcilable opposites. Taking his cue from Post-Impressionist and Cubist ideas about the illusory nature [...]

In this interview, Margarita D’Amico asks Carlos Cruz-Diez about working in urban spaces and using contemporary languages and techniques. The journalist begins her article on a subject of fundamental importance: the artist’s international [...]

This article reports on the activities organized by students at the École de Beaux-Arts in Marseille, France, during Carlos Cruz-Diez’s visit. The students invited him to lead them during the activities devoted to the Fête de la [...]

This newspaper article is about an interview with the director of the Museo de Arte Moderno de México, Fernando Gamboa, on the subject of the exhibition that Carlos Cruz-Diez opened in Mexico City as part of a cultural exchange between Mexico [...]

This newspaper review, which was published in Mexico City, discusses the aesthetic and technical principles underlying the work that Carlos Cruz-Diez produced in urban spaces. The reviewer notes the dynamic nature of the artist’s approach to [...]

In this theoretical text, the visual artist Carlos Cruz-Diez discusses the origin and objectives of his Laberintos de cromosaturación (Chromosaturation Labyrinths). The fundamental idea behind this work involves the viewer’s chromatic [...]

Teresa Alvarenga (a cultural journalist) reviews the opening to the public of the Sala Cruz-Diez, located in the CADAFE building in Caracas. She describes the overall layout of the salon and the works on display, which were made at the workshop [...]

This article, written by one of the best-known critics in Venezuela in the latter half of the twentieth century, is about the opening of the Sala Cruz-Diez at the offices of the electricity company, CADAFE. In this piece—which was probably [...]

This short newspaper article reports that, a day earlier, Carlos Cruz-Diez had received the 1971 National Prize for Visual Art, presented to him by Rafael Caldera at the Palacio de Miraflores (the official residence of the Venezuelan president). [...]

This article by the journalist Coromoto Álvarez is about the National Prize for Visual Art that was awarded to Carlos Cruz-Diez in 1971. The article is divided into two parts. The first part includes a report about the ceremony at the Palacio [...]

This newspaper article reports that Carlos Cruz-Diez has been awarded the National Prize for Visual Arts, a prize that was created by the INCIBA (Instituto Nacional de Cultura y Bellas Artes). This was the first time the prize was awarded to [...]

This newspaper article reports that Carlos Cruz-Diez has arrived in Caracas from Paris to receive the Premio Nacional de Artes Plásticas (National Visual Arts Prize) awarded by the INCIBA (Instituto Nacional de Cultura y Bellas Artes). The [...]

This newspaper article reports on the 1971 Premio Nacional de Artes Plásticas (National Visual Arts Prize), which was awarded to Carlos Cruz-Diez. The chairman of the INCIBA (Instituto Nacional de Cultura y Bellas Artes), Dr. Alfredo Tarre [...]

This short, anonymous newspaper article informs its readers about the solo exhibition of works by Carlos Cruz-Diez scheduled to open on November 17, 1971, at the New York premises of the Denise René Gallery. It states that the artist will show [...]

The critic Roberto Guevara discusses the exhibition presented at the Galería Conkright in Caracas, paying particular attention to the room devoted to Carlos Cruz-Diez and his Colores aditivos (Additive Colors). The article concentrates mainly [...]

This is a review of the work that Carlos Cruz-Diez presented at Art dans la rue (Art in the Street), the event organized by Frank Popper for the Centre National d’Art Contemporain (December 1969). The Venezuelan artist showed his Labyrinthe de [...]

This article argues that, despite multiple pronouncements to the effect that it is dead, Kinetic art is still very much alive and strengthening as a result of its achievements at an international level. The article points to the example set by the [...]

This newspaper article reports on the prizes awarded to Carlos Cruz-Diez and Jesús Soto at the First International Festival of Painting held in Cagnes-sur-Mer, in the south of France. Wearing his nationalist hat, the writer states that these [...]

This article, put out by the EFE agency and published in the Venezuelan newspaper El Mundo, informs its readers about the prizes awarded to Jesús Soto and Carlos Cruz-Diez at a painting festival in the south of France (Cagnes-sur-Mer, near [...]

In this interview, Carlos Cruz-Diez discusses some of Kinetic art’s theoretical problems, in particular its opposition to conventional painting; he opts for a “transpositional” pictorial approach. The artist describes himself as [...]

This short article announces the awarding of the Grand Prize at the III Bienal Americana de Arte in Córdoba, Argentina. The text is divided into two sections: the first one reports the name of the prizewinning artist, Carlos Cruz-Diez, and the [...]

In a lengthy conversation, the Venezuelan journalist Carlos Díaz Sosa discusses the main ideas that underpin the Kinetic artist Carlos Cruz-Diez’s thinking. Despite its length, the conversation barely touches on his repertoire, [...]

This short newspaper article announces that Carlos Cruz-Diez has been awarded the prize at the III Bienal Americana de Arte, the event sponsored by IKA (Industrias Kaiser Argentinas) in the city of Córdoba, Argentina. The article reports on [...]

This is a newspaper article that reviews the opening of the III Bienal Americana de Arte in the city of Cordoba, Argentina. The article reports that the Grand Prize was awarded to the Venezuelan Kinetic artist Carlos Cruz-Diez. It describes the [...]

In this article, Ernesto Ramallo writes about the Bienal Americana de Arte held in Cordoba, Argentina. He traces the history of the event, from its origins in 1958—as the Primer Salón de Artes Visuales Contemporáneas, organized by [...]

In this interview with Paul Keeler, director of Signals gallery in London, the journalist Ratto-Ciarlo asks him about the differences he sees among European, Latin American, and North American art in the mid-1960s. Keeler says he is determined to [...]

This anonymous article provides a brief review of the exhibition schedule that the Venezuelan artist, curator, and museologist, Miguel Arroyo, who at the time was the director of the Museo de Bellas Artes de Caracas, is organizing. The curator’ [...]

The writer of this article fluctuates between his feelings for traditional forms of painting and his admiration for contemporary trends. Rafael Cordero says that being a devotee of painting is not a virtue but in fact is almost a sin, given the [...]

This is an anonymous review of the retrospective exhibition of Cruz-Diez’s work at the Signals gallery in London in 1965. The reviewer notes a constant quality in Venezuelan painting—“clarity, order, and a distinct gentleness&rdquo [...]

Francisco Díaz Roncero—who wrote this review of the second exhibition, Mouvement 2, organized by the Galerie Denise René in Paris that included the works of Kinetic artists—stresses the current influence and presence of [...]

Alberto Junyent reviews the fourth exhibition of La Nouvelle Tendance at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, in Paris, an event in which Carlos Cruz-Diez participated. The reviewer informs his readers that, in the twentieth century, “ [...]

In this article, published in the newspaper El Nacional, Carlos Cruz-Diez reviews the Exposición Internacional de Arte Cinético at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, which was jointly curated by Daniel Spoerri and Pontus Hulten. Cruz- [...]

In this short article José Antonio Rial discusses Carlos Cruz-Diez’s first optical works, his Construcciones en cadena (Chain Constructions), claiming that they provide a glimpse of the Kinetic works whose attempt to portray movement is [...]

This is art critic and journalist Ratto-Ciarlo’s review of the latest Cruz-Diez exhibition that also mentions the trip to Europe the artist will be taking in 1955 after the close of his show. Their conversation focuses on the creation of a [...]

This is a short review of the play by the Italian playwright Ugo Betti: El delito de la Isla de Cabras (Crime on Goat Island), performed by the theater group Sociedad Venezolana del Teatro and directed by the Argentine director Carlos Gorostiza, who [...]

This document includes two newspaper articles. The first announces that the Henrique Otero Vizcarrondo Prize has been awarded to Carlos Cruz-Diez; the prize was created in honor of the founder of the newspaper El Nacional to recognize the work of [...]

This short article, published in the newspaper El Nacional, informs its readers in Caracas that the painter Carlos Cruz-Diez (who, at the time, was employed at the newspaper as an illustrator and layout artist) had been appointed to a professorship [...]

This newspaper review describes certain aspects of the XIII Salón Oficial de Arte Venezolano. It notes that there was “an open, liberal eclecticism” with various mediums (painting, sculpture, and ceramics) shown side by side. This [...]

This short newspaper review about the prizegiving at the XIII Salón de Arte Venezolano (1952) names the winners (one of whom was the young Carlos Cruz-Diez), the members of the jury, and the dignitaries who presented the awards (the Venezuelan [...]

In this short newspaper review of the XI Salón de Arte Venezolano, the critic Rafael Pineda quotes from conversations he had with some of the young artists mentioned by the jury, including Mario Abreu, Lourdes Armas, Alirio Oramas, and R& [...]

In this newspaper article, Manuel Trujillo provides a critical review of the exhibition of works by the young Carlos Cruz-Diez at the Centro Venezolano-Americano de Caracas, which ran from late 1947 to early 1948; this was the artist’s first [...]

This exhibition essay by Julia P. Herzberg reviews the artistic trajectory of Venezuelan artist Nela Ochoa (b. 1953), whose current work is inspired by the medical sciences. Since the 1990s, she has mainly focused on the body, genetics, and [...]

In this interview with Iván Navarro, Julia P. Herzberg poses questions about process and materials, the use of electricity, and art historical influences on his work from the 1990s to the 2000s. Navarro’s Blade Runner series (2004), [...]

Written for Iván Navarro’s midcareer exhibition, this essay explores his early work from the 1990s to the 2000s, enabling us to understand his evolution over time. Growing up in Chile during the Augusto Pinochet regime (1973–90), [...]

This text, included in an exhibition catalogue for artist Carlos Alfonzo, is a transcription of a conversation between Alfonzo and his friend César Trasobares. The interview was videotaped by Alfonzo’s friend Craig Robins in November [...]