Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

In this text written on the occasion of the exhibition L’Avant-Garde held at the Galería Colibrí (1965), Puerto Rican critic Ernesto Ruiz de la Mata discusses what he considers an interesting show of avant-garde prints by artists from different [...]

Chilean art critic Miguel Rojas Mix provides an overview of the exhibition Art in Latin America held at the Hayward Gallery in London in mid-1989. Rojas Mix’s account attempts to explain the curatorial criteria underlying the show, its organization [...]

The Puerto Rican critic Efraín Barradas writes about the full schedule of exhibitions in the United States, where he lives; according to him very few include Latin American art, since little is known about Latin American artists and their work. Be [...]

In this essay, the visual artist Manuel Quintana Castillo suggests that early twentieth century art represents the demise of the art that preceded it. He explains that modern art promotes communication, encourages personal choice as the basis of [...]

This text introduces the print portfolio, Cuba-Colombia, raíces comunes [Cuba/Colombia, Common Roots], the second work of the Corporación Prográfica [Prográfica Association] (Cali, Colombia)—after El graficario de la lucha popular en Colombia [ [...]

In the exhibition catalog for Cuban Artists of the Twentieth Century, which was on view at the Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale, Florida—from October 1993 to January 1994,—art historian Giulio V. Blanc opens his essay by noting the 50th anniversary [...]

The Argentine critic Damián Bayón, who lived in Puerto Rico in the 1950s, claims that the exodus of Latin American artists was good for their aesthetic education. He adds that some artists left their countries when they were very young and were [...]

In his weekly column in the El Comercio newspaper, Luis Miró Quesada Garland discusses the relationship between ethics and art as part of the debate prompted by the survey about “classical” painting and “modern” painting that was sponsored [...]

In this text, Luis Miró Quesada Garland enumerates the main formal virtues of the works in the exhibition of Surrealism held at the Galería de Lima in July 1954. In his view, the show reflects none of the movement’s initial aggressiveness in [...]

The Argentine critic Silvia de Ambrosini claims that there have always been “opponents” in the art field. In her opinion, these “opponents” are what revitalizes the creative atmosphere. She says that in Latin American art & [...]

In this article, Cuban Antonio Núñez Jiménez provides interesting information on the life of Cuban artist Wifredo Lam after he returned to Havana from Europe in 1941 as a refugee of World War II. The article contains direct quotes from Lam on his [...]

Art critic Marta Traba authored the essay “Historia abierta,” which was included among the texts for the exhibition América: Mirada interior. Figari, Reverón, Santa María, in Bogotá, July 4 through August 18, 1985, published by the Banco de [...]

In this text, Damián Bayón considers the question: What qualities make art produced by Latin American artists Latin American? He begins by declaring that the art of Latin America becomes Latin American when an artist—because of his or her [...]

In this text, Frederico de Morais emphasizes the importance—and to a certain extent the impotence—of a greater union among Latin American countries. In the beginning of the passage, he states that Brazil was no longer able to ignore the [...]

In this essay, Randall Morris contextualizes the production of Juan Boza in relationship to the U.S. urban environment in which he was working. He notes that in contemporary western society religious art is often relegated to the margins but, as an [...]

Elena Poniatowska spent time gathering opinions on the Inter-American Biennial of Painting and Printmaking. According to Octavio Paz, the four great masters of painting were Carlos Mérida, Rufino Tamayo, Wilfredo Lam, and Roberto Matta; he felt that [...]

Based on “the tradition of the national”—described as the assemblage of historical reflections regarding said subject on Latin American culture—the Argentina-born but Colombia-based critic, Marta Traba, performed a review of the documentary [...]

Art historian Shifra M. Goldman writes with great acuity and depth about the traveling exhibition, Art of the Fantastic: Latin America, 1920–1987, which opened at the Indianapolis Museum of Art in 1987, and subsequently went to the Queens [...]

In her essay, Marta Traba launches an argument in five parts against nationalism in recent Latin American painting. In the first part, she identifies nationalism as the main problem with regard to contemporary painting. Although it poses as a path to [...]

Art historian Mario Cesar Romero asserts that Puerto Rican-born artist Rafael Colón Morales draws from “irrationalist” schools of Western art—such as the romantics, the Surrealists, and the Abstract Expressionists. The author compares Colón [...]

In this text, writer Juan Ríos remarks on the Surrealist exhibition held at the Galería de Lima in July 1954. In his view, Surrealism is outdated. Initially an iconoclastic movement, it has, over the course of several decades that witnessed a [...]

The author offers a critical, manifesto-style review of the situation in the field of Latin American art and, especially, culture. Alberto Pérez describes himself as an “American,” “Hispanic American,” “Indian [...]