Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

This article by C.A.D.A. (Colectivo Acciones de Arte) describes the group’s participation in the IN/OUT exhibition in Washington, DC. Due to the international nature of the exhibition, the text points out differences, provides some context for [...]

Eugenio Dittborn published a poetic-visual creation in La Separata: a text illustrated with a photograph taken by Carlos Gallardo. Dittborn’s poetic prose is based on three points whose sequence produces a similar structure. It begins with & [...]

In this essay Néstor Olhagaray writes about Yanomami, the video by Juan Downey, focusing on specific moments or scenes. He analyzes the role of the “creator of images” who addresses a proposed fictional reality and its viewers. [...]

In this brief essay Gaspar Galaz discusses a series of landmark events that took place in the 1980s and 1990s. In his opinion this period was characterized by an economic boom in Chile (fueled by neoliberal policies) and by conceptual approaches to [...]

In this article, Gaspar Galaz rates José Balmes as one of the most important painters in the Chilean art world. The writer notes the international influence Balmes brings to his local perspective and concentrates his attention on the paintings [...]

In this historical review, prompted by the exhibition of contemporary Chilean art in Berlin, the artist and teacher Francisco Brugnoli reflects on the “impertinence” of (ethnic-geographical and artistic) otherness as seen from the [...]

Justo Pastor Mellado’s essay “Breve nota sobre pintura chilena: 1950–88,” introduced the traveling exhibition Cirugía Plástica [Plastic Surgery] to Berlin audiences. Mellado mentions certain specific features of [...]

José Joaquín Brunner explains how the authoritarian regime that came into power after the 1973 coup d’état impacted cultural production in its various forms and, more specifically, what was going on in the Escena de [...]

Nelly Richard addresses three different points in her review of Carlos Leppe’s work. She begins by noting his embrace of international art referents, highlighting his exclusion on the grounds of “being Latin American.” In her [...]

In her essay Chile en la XII Bienal de París (Chile at the Twelfth Paris Biennial), Nelly Richard compares the history of Latin American art to the history of art (in its most visible European and North American versions) on the occasion of [...]

In this essay Eugenio Dittborn writes about his Pinturas aeropostales [Airmail Paintings], discussing them in poetic terms laid out in 13 sections in which he describes how they were put together and how they were supposed to function. He explains [...]

Eugenio Dittborn discusses Nelly Richard’s book, Margins and Institutions. Art in Chile Since 1973 (1986), condensing his review into four brief comments. The first considers the text as a “lengthy written work,” which contributes [...]

Nelly Richard writes about Juan Domingo Dávila’s paintings, which rely on quotes, referring to the concept of “bodies” in each of the nine sections in the text. Richard explains how quotes can dismantle the whole and, with it [...]

Diamela Eltit writes about Lotty Rosenfeld’s intervention, which consisted of altering the intermittent lines painted on streets to create traffic lanes. The text is arranged in a non-traditional layout that testifies to its poetic, reflective [...]

Nelly Richard discusses the background that inspired the works that Francisco Brugnoli and Virginia Errázuriz presented at the Paisaje / Brugnoli / Errázuriz exhibition. Richard analyzes the works and notes that, despite the artists& [...]

The essay written by Patricio M. Zárate covered the new emerging generation of Chilean artists. According to the author “customary artistic boundaries had been disregarded” with the incorporation of artistic works pertaining to [...]

Nelly Richard writes about Eugenio Dittborn’s airmail paintings, discussing the folds and marks that are created as they travel through the postal system and what they mean. In her opinion, these “production marks” should be [...]

In the document El arte en Chile: una historia que se recita, otra que se construye (Art in Chile: One Historical Account That Is Recited, Another That Is Constructed), Nelly Richard discusses the historical skullduggery involved in that particular [...]

Néstor Olhagaray, the video maker and researcher, writes about the arrival of video in the Chilean art world. He refers to one of the essential characteristics of the medium, which is its ability to create both a personal and a social [...]

This poetic text refers to the art actions that Juan Castillo produced in 1981. The Chilean artist’s project, titled Te devuelvo tu imagen (I Return Your Image), was photographed by Lotty Rosenfeld. The text describes Rosenfeld’s filming [...]

In this article, Juan Downey alternates between questions and certainties as he writes about video, the medium he used to create his body of work. The title refers to a phrase attributed to Marcel Duchamp, who supposedly said that artists keep [...]

In this interview, on the occasion of his exhibition at the Galería Cromo de Santiago (1977), the artist Carlos Altamirano answers five basic questions about his work. The questions, which relate to an early period in his career, address the [...]

In this essay Pablo Oyarzún, an authority on philosophical matters, discusses Lonquén 10 años (Lonquén 10 Years), the installation by the Chilean artist Gonzalo Díaz, keeping in mind the procedures, relationships, [...]

The document "Eugenio Dittborn y Gonzalo Muñoz: a propósito de la Historia sentimental de la pintura chilena de Gonzalo Díaz" (Eugenio Dittborn and Gonzalo Muñoz: On the Subject of the Sentimental History of [...]

Nelly Richard discusses the artistic aspects of the genre of works by Eugenio Dittborn known as Pintura aeropostal (Airmail Painting). Rather than focusing on a particular work, Richard contemplates the artist’s process and its effects. While [...]

Ronald Christ writes about Catalina Parra’s exhibition Imbunches and mentions a childhood anecdote that evokes the work. He explains that the artist explores different forms of silencing, and her work therefore defies interpretation. The author [...]

As the title implies, this is the response from Milan Ivelic and Gaspar Galaz to the criticisms that appeared following the publication of their jointly written book, La pintura en Chile desde la Colonia hasta 1981 [Painting in Chile from Colonial [...]

The critic and curator Justo Pastor Mellado writes about Gonzalo Díaz’s participation in the exhibition Cuatro artistas chilenos en el CAYC de Buenos Aires: Díaz, Dittborn, Jaar, Leppe. Pastor Mellado discusses the role that D& [...]

The theorist Justo Pastor Mellado outlines his curatorial approach for the exhibition 1973–2000: Transferencia y densidad. He begins by defining concepts such as “curator,” discussing the term’s evolution in Chile and its [...]

Twenty years after the production of Para no morir de hambre en el arte —the first art action performed by CADA (Colectivo Acciones de Arte, Art Actions Collective)—one of the members of the group, Fernando Balcells, discusses its works, [...]

This text by Nelly Richard is based on a collection of quotes, which trace an argumentative arc that express her ideas about the exhibition she is reviewing. She also discusses certain situations in the art field at the time that show how the first [...]

This is Nelly Richard’s “Introduction” to her book Margins and Institutions. Art in Chile Since 1973, in which she outlines the concept of the Escena de Avanzada. The “advanced scene” flourished in an unofficial sector [...]

In this text the cultural critic Nelly Richard poses two questions: What strategy is being used? And what is the policy as regards to a cultural approach? Richard’s questions inform her analysis of the ideas underpinning the Provincia señ [...]

Roberto Merino discusses La nueva novela [The New Novel] by Juan Luis Martínez, concentrating on specific pages in the book and questioning its operations. He addresses the photograph that Lewis Carroll took of Alice Lidell, which Martí [...]

“The broadening of the critical space” represents one section of the book, Chile Arte Actual [Chile Art Today], written by the art historians, Gaspar Galaz and Milan Ivelic. In the book, the authors ask themselves why the late 1970s and [...]

Pablo Oyarzún, the Chilean essayist, discusses Quadrivium, the installation by Gonzalo Díaz. He begins by describing previous installations whose formal designs were also based on the Stations of the Cross and identifies components of [...]

In this review of an exhibition of works by Juan Domingo Dávila, the curator and art critic Justo Pastor Mellado posits a connection between the artist’s work and three critical works (by Eugenio Dittborn, Carlos Altamirano, and Gonzalo [...]

María Eugenia Brito discusses Lotty Rosenfeld’s project Una milla de cruces sobre el pavimento [A Mile of Crosses on the Pavement]. She addresses the artist’s intervention of traffic lines painted on city roads from what she [...]

Adriana Valdés discusses Margins and Institutions. Art in Chile Since 1973, the book by Nelly Richard. Valdés pays particular attention to “the writing scene,” which included Richard as well as others who contributed to the [...]

This essay by Alberto Madrid is on the exhibition Fotografía: intervenciones, cruces y desvíos. His play of words “field of reference out of field” emerged in the essay questioning the bibliographic references with which [...]

In this essay, Rita Ferrer discusses photography based on an international critique of several periods. She refers to authors such as Roland Barthes, Charles Baudelaire, and the Chilean artist Carlos Leppe, claiming that they all share a “ [...]

In this essay, written for the solo show of works by Patricio de la O, the art critic and curator Justo Pastor Mellado discusses the catalogue, the gallery, and the relevant demands on both the painter and the painting itself. Pastor Mellado claims [...]

In discussing the work of Eduardo Vilches, the critic Justo Pastor Mellado refers to two stories, or legends. The first is about the prehistoric origins of painting found on cave walls at Lascaux. The second is about the Italian painter Giorgio [...]

In this essay Justo Pastor Mellado presents an extension of his theory concerning the vital contribution made by printing to the emergence of “modernity” in Chilean art. The text, arranged in 21 sections, describes the evolution of [...]

In this essay Justo Pastor Mellado discusses Quadrivium, the exhibition of works by Gonzalo Díaz, presenting a critical overview of the latter’s production since 1982. Mellado’s review could be split into two parts, each of which [...]

In this essay, Juan Domingo Dávila presents a critical overview of painting in general and a more specific discussion about his own work. He addresses two issues. First, he claims that the “return to painting” is an expression of [...]

In this philosophical text Pablo Oyarzún asks: What is art criticism? What is its function? And what are its characteristics? He begins to answer these questions by seeking to define “criticism” as a subjective opinion about a work [...]

In this text Justo Pastor Mellado discusses the concept of “theoretical transference,” an idea that is mentioned in several of his publications. He uses two fictional models: one refers to the origin myth in Chilean painting, the other to [...]

In her catalogue essay for Rota, the exhibition of works by Juan Domingo Dávila, Diamela Eltit presents an overview of Dávila’s painting, claiming that it always involved a convergence of multiple signs, references from different [...]

In this text Nelly Richard offers a diagnostic on feminism in Chile and its connections to social sciences and art. The author refers to a Feminism (with a capital F) that developed in the social sciences, which became the predominant discourse and [...]