Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

This essay deals with the recurrent theme of Uruguayan art since the nineteenth century, which had continually developed different technical resolutions over time. This critical essay by Vitureira treats the landscape in the context of human [...]

In this text, journalist Sergio Antillano examines the life of his friend and contemporary, artist Héctor Poleo, commenting specifically on his studies at the Academia de Bellas Artes in Caracas and the Academia de San Carlos in Mexico City. [...]

The collector Hans Neumann discusses the Informalist movement’s connection to the emotions, transcendent universes, and what he describes as a “prophetic” nature. He sees Informalism as mankind’s logical reaction to the inexplicable nature of [...]

In this text, critic Federica Palomero explores the development of Venezuelan painter Víctor Hugo Irazábal, from his formative period (the early sixties) and subsequent experimentation with various media and genres through his encounter with the [...]

Researcher Anita Tapias authors the curatorial essay “El metabolismo simbólico de Mario Abreu,” which appears in the catalogue for Mario Abreu. Venezuela. 24th Bienal de São Paulo, Brazil, 1998. Tapias briefly presents the key aesthetic [...]

In this essay, the North American poet and critic Ricardo Pau-Llosa writes about the Venezuelan painter Luis Lizardo on the occasion of the exhibition of work by the latter in the United States (Miami: Ambrosino Gallery, 1992). The critic discusses [...]

This curatorial text by William Niño Araque analyzes the exhibition Max Pedemonte: Muros, templos y ciudadelas (Caracas: Fundación Galería de Arte Nacional, 1994), presenting the work of the sculptor Max Pedemonte. The text is based on an earlier [...]

In this text, historian and critic Roldán Esteva-Grillet reviews the context in which Rafael Monasterios lived and worked, describing his training, early influences, and connection to the generation of painters clustered around the Círculo de [...]

The historian Roldán Esteva-Grillet explains how the work of the Venezuelan landscape painter Rafael Monasterios changed in 1938 when he returned to his birthplace in the state of Lara. The article briefly discusses the time Monasterios spent in the [...]

Bélgica Rodríguez discusses the formal content in Ramón Vásquez Brito’s seascape painting. She explains that it is necessary to consider as a whole the visual and pictorial elements that Vásquez Brito uses—space, color, line, form, rhythm, [...]

Juan Calzadilla provides an overview of the career of Venezuelan artist Emilio Boggio, from his early academic phase through his return to Venezuela in 1919, one year before his death. Calzadilla discusses the influences on Boggio, his travels in [...]

The curator Luis Ángel Duque offers a critical review of the artistic career of Jorge Pizzani during the 1980s. The text covers a period of successive expressive transitions by Pizzani: from drawing to painting, from paper to canvas, and from color [...]

This curatorial text by William Niño Araque reviews the landscape genre in Venezuela starting with an early twentieth-century trend called “national landscape” and the approaches favored by the Círculo de Bellas Artes. The writer concludes his [...]

The curator Federica Palomero introduces Antes del paisaje, the exhibition of works by Octavio Russo. Palomero reviews the artist’s career, and explains how his gradual evolution eventually led him to produce the works on display at this exhibition [...]

In the view of curator Luis Enrique Pérez-Oramas, Juan Araujo’s landscapes have the power to express all the significance that painting can. The works in the exhibition Holanda. Juan Araujo (Caracas: Galería D’Museo, 2002) constitute a free [...]

In this article, the painter and critic Carlos Contramaestre writes about the Venezuelan folk artist Josefa Sulbarán, explaining how she got her start and describing the environment in which she trained as a painter. The critic explains how Sulbará [...]

In his critique, Roberto Guevara reflects on the history of landscape (as a pictorial genre in Venezuela) and the role played within it by Venezuelan painter and graphic designer José Antonio Quintero. After evaluating the distinct stages of this [...]

In his critique, Roberto Guevara reflects on the work of Venezuelan artist José Antonio Quintero, for his show at the Sala Mendoza (Caracas 1981). He states the painter voluntarily takes up the challenge of reevaluating the characteristics of urban [...]

In this essay Mara Comerlati discusses Colinas, árboles y valles, the exhibition of works by José Antonio Quintero at the Sala Mendoza (Caracas, 1981). In this series of drawings and paintings inspired by his observations of the countryside in the [...]

This text by Juan Calzadilla quotes ideas stated by the Venezuelan painter José Antonio Quintero about his own work. In his comments, the artist highlights the fact that his landscapes (whether realistic or imaginary scenes) are personal stories of [...]

This essay by Roberto Guevara was published in the catalogue for the exhibition of works by Adrián Pujol at the Galería de Arte Nacional de Caracas in November 1995. Guevara analyzes Pujol’s work, and discusses the Majorca-born Venezuelan painter [...]

Within the framework of the Exposición Antológica 1975/1995 [Retrospective Exhibition 1975–1995] of Venezuelan painter Adrián Pujol, historian Axel Stein establishes connections between the landscapes of the artist and the other renowned artists [...]

The journalist Edith Guzmán interviews Alirio Palacios about his printmaking and the exhibitions he was involved in at the time. Palacios explains that he has taken up woodcut printing again and has been experimenting with that technique, using what [...]

Writer Enrique Viloria analyzes the work of Miguel von Dangel from a perspective based on environmental conservation, suggesting that in his encapsulated landscapes, nature retains its essence, transcending the work (which is imprisoned and preserved [...]

Writer Eugenio Montejo introduces the graphic work of Alirio Palacios, a master whose work he deems on a level comparable to that of Armando Reverón. In Montejo’s opinion, Palacios was a major figure in Venezuelan art, especially in his treatment [...]

In this essay the critic Francisco Márquez reviews three series of paintings by Miguel von Dangel: Mapas, Oro de América [or Calcos en Oro], and Tierras [or Encapsulados], in which he detects three different ways to approach the Venezuelan and [...]

In this text, art critic Carlos Raygada asserts that Vinatea Reinoso is one of the “most refined and legitimate proponents” of “genuinely Peruvian painting.” The author makes reference to the most outstanding work in the reigning pictorial [...]

This article, written in 1919, was published several months after José Sabogal’s first exhibition due to, as the author explains, “the congestion of opinions, appraisals, and enthusiasm” that circulated at the time. Elvira García y García [...]

In his article, Carlos Raygada clarifies that Alicia Bustamante’s growth as a painter is not based solely on the development of the technical skills she learned at the ENBA (Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes); that growth also demonstrates a “ [...]

This article is about a trip taken by the author, José Eulogio Garrido and José Sabogal, the founder of Peruvian indigenist painting, to the community of Sanchique, in the province of Otuzco in northern Peru. The author describes the mountain [...]

The first chapter of the article “Rodrigo Callejas o el paisaje como obsesión” [Rodrigo Callejas or Landscape as Obsession] by the Colombian painter and printmaker Alberto González Rodríguez discusses the distinction he makes between [...]

The artist, agent, and art critic Leonel Estrada discusses a series of paintings by Armando Villegas that were exhibited at the Chamber of Commerce in Medellín. These works, in Estrada’s opinion, reveal a departure from the artist’s earlier [...]

This text by Colombian writer Enrique Caballero Escovar is a critical review of Ricardo Gómez Campuzano’s pictorial work. In it, Caballero Escovar expresses his admiration for the landscapes by this artist from Bogotá, especially those depicting [...]

Writer Alfonso Dávila divides this text on the work of Colombian artist Francisco Antonio Cano into three parts: (i) “El estudio,” (ii) “Lo místico,” and (iii) “Pintor objetivo.” The first section briefly describes Cano’s studio. The [...]

The book by Beatriz Gonzálezentitled Roberto Páramo: Pintor de la Sabana, published in 1987, contains four brief texts: (i) “Roberto Páramo y la pintura de paisaje en Colombia”, (ii) “Roberto Páramo y la Sabana de Bogotá”, (iii) “ [...]

In an interview with Gloria Valencia Diago of the daily newspaper El Tiempo, Ricardo Gómez Campuzano talked about various matters related to his life as a painter. He spoke about his art training at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes in Colombia [...]

Walter Engel, an Austrian art critic and historian who lived in Colombia, introduces Guillermo Wiedemann, an artist exiled from the repressive environment of Nazi Germany who found the freedom required to develop his personal style in Colombia’s [...]

This poem by Flávio Motta describes the career of artist Marcelo Nitsche by alluding to some of his works. It traces the intersection of landscape, object, calligraphy, and brushwork in Nitsche’s work. He concludes by posing a question that [...]

The researcher and artist Santiago Londoño Vélez reviews the career of the painter Fídolo Alfonso González Camargo, mentioning his time at the School of Fine Arts where he trained under Ricardo Acevedo Bernal and Andrés de Santa María. The [...]

In this little known interview, Colombian painter Francisco Antonio Cano provides an emotional account of his early days in Yarumal, “a village nestled in the mountains of Antioquia [Colombia].” He mentions his early accomplishments in Medellín [...]

This article mentions the Colombian artists Judith Márquez, Cecilia Porras, and Lucy Tejada who showed their work at Three Women Painters of Colombia, the exhibition held at the Pan-American Union in Washington, DC, May 5–25, 1960. They were [...]

The article “Alicia Barney: el paisaje alternativo, aferrada al drama que la naturaleza provoca” [Alicia Barney: The alternative landscape, clinging to the drama that nature brings] by Colombian critic Miguel González was published in the [...]

The art critic Mário Pedrosa recalls that, on a visit to the Brazilian artist Djanira’s studio he was reminded of the landscape problem in Brazilian painting. In his opinion Alfredo Volpi came up with a “masterly” solution by capturing the [...]

In this “Segundo Manifiesto”—jointly written by members of El Techo de la Ballena (Caracas, 1961–68)—the group identified the artistic movements they challenged as follows: traditional landscape painting, social realism, geometrical [...]

This document is an interview conducted by Mari Carmen Ramírez, the Puerto Rican curator who is based in the United States, with Domingo García, the artist. In the interview, García explains why, after mounting an exhibition of portraits entitled [...]

In his review of the exhibition “Paisaje Venezolano” held at the Museo de Bellas Artes in August 1942, critic Enrique Planchart underscores the importance of French-Venezuelan painter Emilio Boggio to the national art scene. Planchart [...]

The curator Ruth Auerbach reviews the 1.a Bienal Nacional del Paisaje Tabacalera Nacional (August—October, 1996), basing her critique on this genre’s contemporary view and its important position in the history of universal art. Auerbach pays [...]

Juan Liscano reviews the show that Gabriel Bracho had in 1951 at the Museo de Bellas Artes de Caracas. The author notes that the painter, a dedicated follower of David Alfaro Siqueiros, “aspires to the fresco” and captures the problems and [...]

This essay by the novelist Rómulo Gallegos, about the life and career of the painter Manuel Cabré, was published on the occasion of the artist’s solo exhibition in 1920. The young writer describes the character, style, and originality of the work [...]

In the first part of his extensive review of the Exposición del Paisaje Venezolano, which took place in 1942 at the Museo de Bellas Artes of Caracas, Enrique Planchart establishes a chronological framework that distinguishes the pioneers (he calls [...]