Tercera Parte Oviedo

SÍNTESIS DE LOS TEXTOS Version en inglés Véronique Viala de Gallardo WHATISTHE PAINTING OF HISTORY? THE ROOTS of the word “history” re- clouds. The work of French-Guadelou- fer to the quest of information, of truth, pean artist Guillon-Lethière, showing to the telling, the analysis and the inter- Haitian generals Pétion and Dessalines pretation of events, to a history that is sealing their union under the look of the course of life and fate as well as the God and trampling the chains of slavery, discipline that studies them. The means is an example of this style. Eugène De- of expression have become more nu- lacroix, the last great European histori- merous over the centuries, images have cal painter, was able to breathe a mythi- come to reinforce writing. Photography cal dimension to political and social rea- changed the course of representative lities. art, imposing its testimony, and taking The advent of photography and the away from the painting of history one first photoreports were to change Wes- of its raisons d'être, the visual account tern painting of history. Figurative com- of facts. As for Ramón Oviedo, he has memoration was to survive in some never stopped reinterpreting and rein- compositions during the XXth century, OVIEDO. Extinction of a race. venting history. about World War I, for example, going Mythification was an integral part of back to outmoded aesthetic forms. As traditional rhetoric and painting of his- for painting under the Western dicta- tory. Both the classical and the romantic torships, it was a mere propaganda ve- eras were times of tributes and apolo- hicle of poor pictorial quality. gies. Official art didn't give the artist A masterpiece was then to show the much room for freedom. Its favorite new way to the painting of history in form was the court portrait, Rigaud's European and universal modernity. Pa- portrayal of King Louis XIVth being ty- blo Picasso's “Guernica”, a metaphor of pical of this genre. However some pain- this Bask city flattened by German ters like Francisco de Goya did cast a bombs in April 1937, is also the work critical eye on their models. that motivated Ramón Oviedo most. In The painting of history was always it, Picasso's allegory and visual fable we- questioned, even by “its” painters. From re able to represent, not only the tra- Baron Gros, Napoléon Ist's painter, gedy of a people but also that of violen- whom the great neo-classical painter ce, of total destruction, creating a fasci- David advised to go back to “the genui- nation that spontaneously produces si- ne painting of history”, to David himself, lence . none of them was spared critics. In Latin America, where painting of In the XIXth century, the artists took history and official portraits of the reality to “surrealistic” levels, weaving the XIXth century were following European glorification of fallen heroes with eternal realistic schemes, Mexican muralism life in kitsch worlds full of half-naked dei- opened an original, didactical and revo- ties and sun rays bursting through the lutionary path. For David Alfaro Siquei- 61 PABLO PICASSO. Guernica ros, one of the three great Mexican mu- conveying solidarity with the victims. ralists, it was a monumental and heroic, Cuban art in the 80s and 90s, at least as human and popular art, a vibrant lesson critical towards the revolutionary regi- of patriotism and art. The hostile reac- me as laudatory about its success, is al- tion to this school on the part of youn- so a good example of this trend. For ger painters took Mexican painting of despite the rise of some political and history to the same place as elsewhere religious fondamentalisms, our time rein Latin America and Europe. In actual jects dogmatism in art.The plastic trans- fact, contemporary painting of history in position of history has become a perso- the world doesn't seek to report facts nal and critical business, often in solida- or exalt remembrances, it aims at trans- rity with the weakest, the wretched, the forming pain, denunciations, claims. Af- victims. Studies and investigations are ter World War II, it reached a point of carried out to support often iconoclast almost abstract expression, as if to re- works proclaiming both the cultural ject the extraordinary atrocities of the identity and universal actuality, an “inter- concentration camps, the holocaust and breeding” that is also a reflection of the the atomic “punishments”. ethnic reality and leaves its mark on his- Human rights, torture, civil and mili- tory-inspired art. tary violence, injustice, are among the Exhibitions in Venice, Sao Paulo, Jo- topics developed, especially since the hannesburg and Kassel, among others, 80's and in Latin America.We shall quo- have presented many of these artists te Oswaldo Guayasamín's -great friend who are the new “historiographers” of Oviedo's- “Chapell of Man”, a gigan- judging our time. tic work, the walls of which pay tribute to the Indians, denounce colonialism and fight dictatorship. This “new commitment”, nowadays expressed more often through installations, “performances” or mixed sup- ports than painting, is often radical. We shall mention here Uruguayan artist and critic Luis Camnitzer's works, always 62 THE PAINTING OF HISTORY IN DOMINICAN ART ALL LATIN AMERICAN and Caribbean 1961), who didn't bring as much pressu- countries have sought to find their own re to bear on plastic arts as on others, national plastic expression, and the Do- the “chief”'s feats didn't stimulate them minican Republic is no exception. The any more. Although one can discern a first manifestation of truly Dominican subtle opposition in some of Silvano Lo- art is the small caricature of a Haitian ra's and Eligio Pichardo's works, the soldier carved on wood, a piece attribu- “glorifying” works, commissioned por- ted to Domingo Echavarría.The first ar- traits and busts were of rather poor tists who tried to define a local identity quality. were, in their style, late romantics. Alt- In 1961, the execution of the dictator hough there were not many of them at created great commotion. Jaime Colson the end of the XIXth century, and the immortalized a decisive moment of the THÉODORE CHASSERIAU. history of art dedicates more attention struggle with his “Heroes of Espaillat Black man falling into space. to some of them than they might have street”. Democratization opened the received at other times, they played an way to a free and dynamic cultural life in important part in the development of art and litterature. Four years later, when Dominican plastic arts. the April Revolution broke out after the Alejandro Bonilla treated geographi- coup d'Etat against Juan Bosch and the cal and historical themes in a somehow Second North-American Invasion, a mi- “naïve” way that holds for us today an litant painting surged from the city in attraction maybe not well perceived arms, and History launched the great earlier on. Luis Desangles, a versatile ar- era of Dominican painting. tist, concentrated on the historical gen- Cándido Bidó, Gilberto Hernández re, between testimony and mythification: Ortega, Norberto Santana, Coco Gon- exemplary and patriotical scenes, epic tier, Asdrúbal Domínguez, Ada Balcácer, and allegorical episodes of secular or re- Domingo Liz, Ramírez Conde, and of ligious nature, portrayal of social cus- course, Silvano Lora and Ramón Ovie- toms, colonial architecture, portraits of do: art, and culture at large stood up, in notables, probably make him our “pu- 1965, for national sovereignty and the rest” historical painter, and Juan Pablo return to the Constitution. Posters, cari- Duarte's best portraitist. catures, and expressionist paintings all This longing to excite the heroism of shouted out “Yankees, go home!”, one the past also appears in Abelardo Rodrí- could even see a painting of a Christ of guez Urdaneta's statutes, and in Enrique the barricades, a rifle in his hands. This García Godoy's paintings, whose “En- passion lasted until 1972, when the counter between Martí and Máximo “New Image” exhibition was held in Gómez”, although not his best work, is Santiago. Later on, styles diversified and precious to our heart for the accuracy commitment weakened as the art mar- of the facts and people it presents. kets strengthened. Art became largely The artists who launched the mo- non political, the history of Western dern period were only marginally inte- painting interested painters more than rested in a plainly commemorative or the painting of history. Few of them did patriotic painting. Under Trujillo (1930- not follow this trend. Oviedo, painting 63 SILVANO LORA. Those. past and present times in symbols; Ada and, beyond painting, presents them in Balcácer and Fernando Peña Defilló, ex- installations, these metaphors of upset- ploring Dominican myths; Alberto Bass, ting realities. Also the artist sometimes the only photorealist in the country; Jo- chooses to express values and beliefs in sé García Cordero then making his dé- a remote historical context, like Fernan- but; Jorge Severino and José Cestero, do Varela with biblical times. who used history and the history of art The big issues of this ending century in their paintings and drawings; José Per- are of concern to the artists, and when domo and Antonio Guadalupe, introdu- Tony Capellán, Marcos Lora Read or Jor- cing in their works elements of Taino ori- ge Pineda go from anthropology to gin. But the inspiration at large came ideology through paintings, drawings or from the artists' personal history. installations, those environments allow Thís painting of history almost totally them to reach a particularly strong and disappeared over the last twenty years, relevant expression. Ramón Oviedo, and exceptions to this trend will pro- thanks to his system of signs and sym- bably not come down to posterity.

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