Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

This 1978 article was published in El Nacional to inform the Venezuelan public about Mercedes Pardo’s exhibition at Museo de Arte Moderno de México (MAM). The subheading introduces the text by the director of the MAM, Fernando Gamboa, [...]

Art critic Juan Acha writes about the retrospective of the Venezuelan abstract artist Mercedes Pardo, held at Museo de Arte Moderno de México. He argues that the exhibition of over twenty years of artistic production (1952–78) shows us [...]

This article was written on the occasion of the exhibition of Venezuelan abstract modernist Mercedes Pardo at Museo de Arte Moderno de México that featured works from the early 1950s to her most recent production: all abstract works, since she [...]

In this article for The Daily Journal, Baiba Pecins writes about Mercedes Pardo on the occasion of the exhibition of her work at the GAN (Galería de Arte Nacional) in Caracas. The article is introduced by observations on luminosity and [...]

In this 1979 article in El Nacional, María Josefa Pérez interviews Mercedes Pardo regarding her retrospective exhibition Color: piel, presencia meditada. Mercedes Pardo Exposición antológica at the GAN ( [...]

In this 1991 article written for El Universal, María Ramírez Ribes presents the Mercedes Pardo retrospective Moradas del color, on view at the GAN (Galeria de Arte Nacional) in Caracas. The works on show span from 1941 to 1991 and [...]

This article was published in El Universal to report the national success of the Venezuelan pioneer of modernism Mercedes Pardo, awarded with the Premio Armando Reverón. The anonymous author explains that the prize is given by the AVAP ( [...]

As a prominent figure of Venezuelan culture herself, Ida Gramcko reflects on the success of the abstract painter Mercedes Pardo, 1991 winner of the Premio Armando Reverón. Being awarded a prize is not a “guarantee of the quality” [...]

This article appeared in El Nacional the day of the opening of Obra gráfica de Mercedes Pardo at the Galería Los Espacios Cálidos in Caracas. The show was organized in tandem by the Ateneo de Caracas and the GAN (Galería [...]

This article was written for El Globo on the occasion of the exhibition Obra Grafica de Mercedes Pardo, recently opened at the Galería de los Espacios Calidos of the Ateneo de Caracas. The author positions the work of the abstract artist both [...]

This article, published in El Nacional in February 1995, was written on the occasion of the closure of Obra Grafica de Mercedes Pardo at the Galería de los Espacios Cálidos del Ateneo de Caracas. The show was co-organized by the GAN ( [...]

This article was published in El Nacional (Caracas, August 11, 1996), on the day of the opening of Mercedes en el Museo Sacro. Obras recientes de Mercedes Pardo in this institution. This anonymous text points to a dual reading of the exhibition&rsquo [...]

Yasmin Monsalve writes this article for El Globo, Caracas, for the upcoming opening of an exhibition of Mercedes Pardo in Galeria del Sacro. Fourteen paintings and ten screenprints are shown after her five years of silence. The works are said to be [...]

Virginia Minaya promotes Mercedes Pardo’s exhibition at the Museo Sacro of Caracas in this newspaper article of September 2, 1996. The show is presented as the optimistic return of Pardo to the art scene with twenty-four recent works that [...]

Gustavo Jaén writes this article for the Caracas newspaper El Universal, on the occasion of the exhibition of Mercedes Pardo’s work at the Museo Sacro. By introducing the significance of color in her work—with references to its [...]

This article was written by Yolanda Pantin for the newspaper El Nacional, on August 14, 2004. This “portrait” of the Venezuelan modernist artist Mercedes Pardo includes her biographical information in the form of a subheading that refers [...]

This article by Miriam Freilich was written on the occasion of the retrospective Mercedes Pardo: Moradas del Color, held at GAN (Galeria de Arte Nacional) in Caracas and covering fifty years of her production through 258 artworks. The author [...]

This article, published in the Caracas newspaper El Nacional in December 1983, was written by the Venezuelan journalist Ida Gramcko. The occasion was an exhibition of Mercedes Pardo’s postcards at Galeria Sagitario (Caracas) titled Inesauribile [...]

This article, published in the Caracas newspaper El Nacional, announces the upcoming opening of the exhibition 1x9, serigrafia del color by the Venezuelan abstract painter Mercedes Pardo, held at the Museo de Bellas Artes in the capital city. The [...]

In this catalogue exhibition essay for the GAN (Galería de Arte Nacional) in Caracas, Humberto Mata discusses the work of the Venezuelan modernist Mercedes Pardo. The writer personifies his text describing his brief encounters with the painter [...]

In this article, the poet, painter and art critic Juan Calzadilla provides a broad historical overview of the major changes in Venezuelan avant-garde art, focusing especially on the shift from figurative schools to abstract and participatory [...]

In this article written for the newspaper Jueves/El Nacional around 1961, Esteban Muro describes a party and performance in Caracas held by the Venezuelan avant-garde group El Techo de la Ballena. He farcically begins the letter as an oficial RSVP to [...]

The synopsis and annotations in English are coming soon [...]

This catalogue accompanied the 1959 exhibition of twelve oil paintings by Elsa Gramcko, an abstract artist from Venezuela, at the Pan American Union of the Organization of American States in Washington, D.C. This exhibition marked Gramcko’s [...]

[In this text], Miyó Vestrini interviews Mario Abreu, who states that he has captured the exuberance and mysteries of Venezuela in his work. His magical objects represent an encounter with the traditions wherein he found his own existence; they fuse [...]

This text by curator Zuleiva Vivas provides a visual overview of and a reflection on the works by Ricardo Alcaide, Nelsón Garrido, María Eugenia Arria, Alberto Asprino, Mauricio Lupini, Alfredo Ramírez, Luisa Richter, Fabiola Sequera, Jesús [...]

In his review of the XIX Salón de Arte Venezolano (1958), the critic Perán Erminy notes the ingenious reliance on historical criteria in the arrangement of works selected for the event, from the old landscape masters to the new style of Abstract [...]

From the seven chapters of the book Poleo. Categorías del espíritu,written by historian Carlos Silva about the paintings of Héctor Poleo, this text represents the third chapter, “Arte y estilo de Héctor Poleo,” wherein the essayist analyzes [...]

Juan Calzadilla refers to the latest installment in Alejandro Otero’s Papeles coloreados series; he calls the artist’s current period his most important one since Coloritmos, and identifies an underlying synthesis of the artist’s creative [...]

The sculptor Pedro Briceño writes this critique about Iván Petrovszky, the Venezuelan painter of Hungarian descent. The text is introduced with a general appreciation of his artistic personality, highlighting, among other things, the seriousness of [...]

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. [...]

In this essay, Spanish journalist Francisco Villanueva y López de y Uralde asserts that an American awakening is underway in the New World, particularly in Mexico, Peru, and Cuba, owing to thinkers in each republic, such as José Vasconcelos, Juan [...]

In this article, the journalist Víctor Alberto Grillet describes both the legend of “María Lionza” and the painting by Pedro Centeno Vallenilla. Grillet speaks highly of the Venezuelan painter’s Americanist style—which he says differs from [...]

The art critic Víctor Guédez discusses the work of Henry Bermúdez, referring to this Venezuelan visual artist’s recurring themes. Guédez describes the formal elements in his work and analyzes the symbolic values of some of the pieces presented [...]

In this essay, the well-known critic Roberto Guevara discusses the evolution in the Chinese-Venezuelan visual artist Francisco “Chino” Hung’s style. Guevara bases his remarks on a review of the artist’s works from the early 1960s until the [...]

In this essay, researcher Zhelma Portillo catalogues the themes in the work of popular Venezuelan artist Francisco Luna Ostos that are most emblematic, and she also describes some of his creative approaches [...]

In this article, the curator Bélgica Rodríguez reviews the career of the Venezuelan sculptor and draftsman Felipe Herrera, from his early training in the late 1960s to his most recent work, produced in 1996. After sketching a broad overview of the [...]

Poet and critic Carlos Augusto León envisions the exhibition of work by Venezuelan painter Rafael Monasterios reviewed in this text as part of a process of discovering the country through art. As precedents for the work of Monasterios, he cites [...]

Luis Pérez-Oramas wrote this curatorial text on the exhibition Usted, el espacio by the Venezuelan artist Alí González exhibiting at the Galería D’Museo (Caracas, 2001). Opting to envision the work poetically, he approaches the work of Gonzá [...]

The curator Cecilia Fajardo-Hill introduces the exhibition Usted, el espacio by the Venezuelan visual artist Alí González, held at the Galería D’Museo in Caracas in 2001. In connection with that event, the curator discusses the artist’s recent [...]

The art critic Roberto Guevara wrote a text with the title “Salir fuera,” which introduced the exhibition brochure for Pasta dominical by Clemencia Labin at the Galería Sala Alternativa (Caracas, 1997). The writer begins with a description of [...]

In this text, critic Carlos Silva places emphasis on Hugo Baptista’s skill as a painter. Baptista’s work is characterized by a lyrical use of color and an expressive approach to painterly material. It is with good reason, Silva asserts, that [...]

Researcher and historian Bélgica Rodríguez analyzes the work of Hugo Baptista in a biographical text with quotations made by the painter; beginning with the artist’s move to Caracas in 1951 so that he could enroll in Vicente Emilio Sojo’s [...]

The curator Julieta González discusses the work presented by two contemporary artists, Juan Nascimento and Daniela Lovera, in the La colección exhibition at the Sala Mendoza(Caracas, 1998). González indicates that there is a conceptual basis of [...]

In this text, Venezuelan artist Ana Villanueva evidences her connection to nature and describes what she attempts to convey in her paintings of fish, plants, fruit, and other elements found in nature. Villanueva explains that, with the works in the [...]

In connection with the exhibition Antología del desarraigo (1992), the curator Katherine Chacón writes about the career of the Venezuelan mixed-media artist, Ángel Vivas Arias. The writer highlights the duality of mysticism and nature evident [...]

The critic José María Salvador interviews the Venezuelan sculptor José Jesús Moros. Salvador discusses the salient features of the sculptor’s recent work, mentioning the relationship between the horizontal, vertical, and diagonal arrangement of [...]

This is the script for a documentary about Jesús Rafael Soto, written by Clara Diament de Sujo—the noted essayist and gallery owner, who lived in Caracas at that time—and produced by Ángel Hurtado for National Television – Canal 5 (Venezuela [...]

The historian Alfredo Armas Alfonzo studies mid-twentieth century Venezuelan art (between 1940 and 1958) through the survey of the first nineteen years of art salons in the country. Following his analysis of the sociocultural context that certain [...]

The Venezuelan critic Roberto Guevara discusses Vertical vibrante—the work by the Venezuelan painter and sculptor Alejandro Otero—which he considers to be a seminal achievement in the Venezuelan visual arts. Guevara ponders the different stages [...]