Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

In this book, Margarita Nelken, a Spanish critic based in Mexico, discusses the development of Expressionism in Mexican art. She argues that Mexican Expressionism has a native origin that, with the passage of time, has been enriched by the different [...]

This document is the first section of Margarita Nelken’s book Pintores de México [Painters of Mexico], which she wrote by commission of the Secretaría de Educación Pública [SEP, Ministry of Public Education]. Nevertheless, it was never [...]

Margarita Nelken reports on the Torres de Ciudad Satélite [Satellite City Towers] project that had been designed in tandem by Mathias Goeritz and the architect Luis Barragán. Although the art critic celebrates the innovative sculptural design of [...]

In this article, Margarita Nelken looks back over Alice Rahon’s career. Nelken explains that Rahon, the French artist who straddled between both Surrealist painting and Surrealist poetry, had shaken off her father’s aesthetic influence [...]

This short article by the art critic Margarita Nelken comments on the recent inauguration in Paris of the traveling exhibition of Mexican art with work ranging from the pre-Columbian period up to the date of the article. She describes the artistic [...]

This article announces a new column in the magazine Hoy that will feature “weekly comments from the desk of a Mexican diplomat who, for obvious reasons, wishes to remain anonymous.” Covering each of the days of the previous week, the author of [...]

In the late 1940s, Margarita Nelken reflects on the difficulties facing artistic creation during a period marked by a “lack of poise and harmony.” The new art must not distance itself from society: “The individualist formula that has lasted [...]

This article wonders about the new slate of directors that will take over at the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes (INBA) during the new administration under President Adolfo Ruiz Cortines (1952-58). Though the article praises the accomplishments of [...]

Margarita Nelken’s biography of Rufino Tamayo includes stories that explain how his painting evolved along different paths from the ones taken by the Big Three. Though he acknowledged his indigenous identity, that particular factor did not lead him [...]

This is a review of the exhibition Diego Rivera. 50 años de su labor artística [Diego Rivera: 50 Years of Artistry], held at the Museo de Artes Plásticas in the Palacio de Bellas Artes, and which analyzed the aesthetic “influences” of his [...]

The critic Margarita Nelken analyzes the success of the show organized at Galería Excélsior under the title Arte y Libertad [Art and Freedom] by the Asociación Mexicana por la Libertad de la Cultura. “The key feature of this exhibition is the [...]

This article reviews the second solo exhibition of Vicente Rojo held at the Galería Proteo under the title Presagios [Omens], which encompasses the subject matter of his work. Among other omens rendered are those that foretold the Conquest, in [...]

In this article Margarita Nelken, the critic of Spanish origin, reviews the Salón Anual de Pintura that is taking place at the Salón de la Plástica Mexicana (SPM) in Mexico City. After appreciating the work of a few of the exhibitors, the author [...]

The Spanish art critic Margarita Nelken uses the term “Decoración Mexicana” [Mexican Decoration] as the title of her article on the work created at the Multifamiliar Benito Juarez [Benito Juárez Residential Project] by the Guatemalan artist [...]

Margarita Nelken believed that the exhibition of Mexican art presented in Paris, Stockholm and London committed great injustices. One of these was its failure to show any work done by young Mexican artists. By way of example, she mentioned the [...]

This article celebrates the first anniversary of Páginas de Artes Plásticas [Visual Arts Page], the Sunday section of Excélsior where Margarita Nelken contributes a regular column. She muses on “what a page like this can, and should, do in a [...]

In this article, the author Margarita Nelken recalls her meeting in Madrid with the Mexican painter Alfredo Ramos Martínez who had at the time organized an exhibition of works produced by the Escuelas de Pintura al Aire Libre [Open-Air Painting [...]

This short article revolves around the events surrounding the Exhibition of Mexican Art with work that ranged from pre-Columbian times up to the date of the article. Organized by the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes (INBA), it was about to be shown [...]

This article includes a collection of remarks made by a number of Spanish and Mexican critics on the occasion of the exhibition of works by the caricaturist Eduardo Robles “Ras” at the Ateneo Español de México. The critic Margarita Nelken, who [...]

Margarita Nelken describes the Second Biennial for Young Artists, in Paris, and the exhibition of the Los hartos [Fed Up] group in the Galería Antonio Souza in Mexico City as the end of one era and the beginning of another. The Los hartos “ [...]

In this interview, Margarita Nelken, the Spanish critic, reacts to the opinions expressed by David Alfaro Siqueiros. Nelken defends her comments concerning the lack of innovation in Diego Rivera’s art, and says that it is regrettable to attempt to [...]

In spite of the campaign of negative criticism against him, Rufino Tamayo said he was pleased with the way he had been received by the people of Mexico. He also said that a Mexican’s success was always a source of great satisfaction. Tamayo was [...]

An exhibition of gouaches by José Clemente Orozco at the photographer Lola Álvarez Bravo’s gallery on Amberes street inspires Margarita Nelken to discuss a number of subjects that were topical in artistic circles at that time. Among them: whether [...]