The Ring and I: What Appears As the Work of Carlos Amorales Bethany L
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Florida State University Libraries Electronic Theses, Treatises and Dissertations The Graduate School 2006 The Ring and I: What Appears as the Work of Carlos Amorales Bethany L. Marrier Follow this and additional works at the FSU Digital Library. For more information, please contact [email protected] THE FLORIDA STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF VISUAL ARTS, THEATRE AND DANCE THE RING AND I: WHAT APPEARS AS THE WORK OF CARLOS AMORALES By Bethany L. Marrier A Thesis submitted to the Department of Art History in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts Degree Awarded: Spring Semester, 2006 Copyright ©2006 Bethany L. Marrier All Rights Reserved The members of the Committee approve the thesis of Bethany L. Marrier defended on March 24, 2006. _____________________________ Tatiana Flores Professor Directing Thesis _____________________________ Adam Jolles Committee Member _____________________________ Robinson Herrera Committee Member Approved: _________________________ Paula Gerson, Chair, Department of Art History _________________________ Sally McRorie, Dean, College of Visual Arts, Theatre and Dance The Office of Graduate Studies has verified and approved the above named committee members. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I thank Tatiana Flores for her encouragement, guidance, and devotion to the critical study of Latin American art; as well as Adam Jolles and Robinson Herrera for providing me with bibliographic resources; Matthew Corey for his constant support; and Sabaa Rehmani and Carlos Perez de Alejo for always wanting to watch Santo movies. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures …………………………………………………………………………v Abstract ………………………………………………………………………………..viii INTRODUCTION …………………………………………………………………….1 1. CARLOS AMORALES, LUCHA LIBRE, AND THE CROWD-AT-HAND …..…12 2. HOW THE WEST WAS WON: CLARIFYING THE “BARBARIC” SPORT OF LUCHA LIBRE ……………………………………………………………………..…29 3. E-PRIME: A THEORETICAL APPROACH FOR MASS-INTERPRETATION OF THE WORK OF CARLOS AMORALES ………..……………………….….………44 CONCLUSION ……………………………………………………………………….57 APPENDIX A ……………………………………………………………………...…87 BIBLIOGRAPHY …………………………………………………………………….88 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH ………………………………………………………….94 iv LIST OF FIGURES 1.1 Julio Galán, China poblana, 1987 ………………………………………………….64 1.2 Francis Alÿs, from the series Ambulantes I, 1995-2001 ……………………………64 1.3 Daniela Rossell, from the series Ricas y famosas, 1994-2001 ……………………..65 1.4 Carlos Amorales, film still from Anonymous Group Party, 1996 ………………….65 1.5 Carlos Amorales, film still from Anonymous Group Party, 1996 ………………….66 1.6 Carlos Amorales, film still from Ray Rosas New Workshop, 1997 …………………66 1.7 Carlos Amorales, film still from Interim Performance, 1997 ………………………67 1.8 Carlos Amorales, film still from Amorales Table Dance, 1997 …………………….67 1.9 Carlos Amorales, film still from In Conversation with Superbarrio, 1997 ……..…..68 1.10 Carlos Amorales, film still from Amorales vs Amorales in Peace, 1999 ………….68 2.1 Carlos Amorales, film still from Amorales vs Amorales in Peace, 1999 …………...69 2.2 Carlos Amorales, film still from Amorales vs Amorales in Peace, 1999 …………...69 2.3 Carlos Amorales, image of Fanzine, 1999 …………………………………………..70 2.4 Carlos Amorales, film still from For the First Time in Paris, 2000 ………………...70 2.5 Carlos Amorales, film still from Evil Wins in Paris, 2000 ………………………….71 2.6 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, Tijuana, 2001 …………………………...71 2.7 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, Tijuana, 2001 …………………………...72 2.8 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, Tijuana, 2001 …………………………...72 2.9 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, Tijuana, 2001 …………………………...73 2.10 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, Tijuana, 2001 ………………………….73 2.11 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, Tijuana, 2001 ………………………….74 v 2.12 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, Tijuana, 2001 ………………………….74 2.13 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, San Diego, 2001 ………………………75 2.14 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, San Diego, 2001 ………………………75 2.15 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, San Diego, 2001 ………………………76 2.16 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, San Diego, 2001 ………………………76 2.17 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, San Diego, 2001 ………………………77 2.18 Carlos Amorales, film still from My Way, San Diego, 2001 ………………………77 3.1 Edouard Manet, Mademoiselle V. Meurent in the Costume of an Espada, 1862 …...78 3.2 Pablo Picasso, Corrida: La mort du torero, 1933 …………………………………..78 3.3 “The Saint, the Silver-Masked Man,” Publication for El Santo’s retirement, 1982 ...79 3.4 DVD cover image for Santo y Blue Demon contra Drácula y el Hombre Lobo (“Santo and Blue Demon vs. Dracula and the Wolf Man”), 1972 ……………………….79 3.5 Rubio and Frankie working out ……………………………………………………..80 3.6 Lourdes Grobet, Crypt Containing the Mortal Remains of the Silver-Masked Man, El Ángel Mausoleum, Mexico City, 2002 …………………………………………80 4.1 Carlos Amorales, film stills from the “tele-journeys” catalogue, Amorales vs. Amorales (El Olympico and Amorales), 1990-2001 [sic] …………….…………81 5.1 Frida Kahlo, The Two Fridas, 1939 …………………………………………………81 5.2 Pablo Picasso, Self Portrait with a Palette, 1906 …………………………………...82 5.3 Salvador Dalí, L’Invention des monstres, 1937 ……………………………………..82 5.4 Demián Flores Cortés, Arena México, 1999 ………………………………………...83 5.5 Victor Gastelum, Santo Jr., 1996 ……………………………………………………83 5.6 Xavier Garza, El Santo (The Saint), 2003 …………………………………………...84 5.7 José Lozano, Héroe/Hero, 1991 …………………………………………………….84 5.8 Francisco Enrique Delgado, Libertad, 1998 ………………………………………...85 vi 5.9 Francisco Enrique Delgado, Llanta, 1999 ……………… …………………………85 5.10 Guillermo Gómez-Peña, Family Portrait, 1990 …………………………………...86 5.11 Matthew Barney, the artist as her Giant, from Cremaster 5: her Giant, 1997 ……..86 vii ABSTRACT This thesis examines the work of contemporary Mexican artist Carlos Amorales dealing with the theme of lucha libre, professional Mexican wrestling. It assess the critical literature on the subject and offers new avenues of interpretation. Specifically, I relate Amorales’ lucha libre works to critical theories on the spectacle, performance art, wrestling, and the semantic framework E-Prime as a means of clarifying misinterpretations in the surrounding discourse on the artist. In this vein, I pay close attention to the sport of lucha libre itself as a historical and cultural entity in Mexico and propose a method for broadening the artist’s interpretive audience. viii INTRODUCTION I want work that looks Mexican: I want to see pyramids, jungles, Mayan temples.1 When an editor of an Italian art magazine voiced the above statement to cultural critic Rubén Gallo, he or she clearly lacked any comprehension of the contemporary cultural scene in Mexico. Despite the level of ignorance evident in this remark, the words have an overwhelming implication: when the contemporary Western art world speaks, the bright-eyed, emerging artists listen – and they listen well. But to what degree? Would an artist modify his own portfolio according to the current trends in contemporary art, even so much as to drastically switch to a subject “closer to home”? The thought of an “undiscovered” Mexican artist, at this moment, promoting himself to a gallery with a portfolio full of modernist Mayan temple paintings in the hopes of striking it big seems a bit disheartening, even fantastic. But perhaps even more fantastic is believing that this would never happen; to what degree do artists cater to market pressures? Could it be that art is tailor-made? Assume for a moment, as a young artist from Mexico, you have come across the following quote by Cuauhtémoc Medina from 2002, “There is no doubt that Mexican art is caught up in the cyclical current through which every five years, a given country… is suddenly incorporated into – and rapidly discarded from – the geographies of global culture.”2 Would you assume that your future hinged on these mere five years of which Medina writes? For an artist with an entire career ahead, would five years of Mayan temple paintings be considered a compromising of talent or a carefully crafted strategy? Historicizing Contemporary Mexican Art 1 Qtd. in Rubén Gallo, New Tendencies in Mexican Art (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004) 19. 2 Qtd. in Gallo 12. 1 The quote discussed above would seem to imply that contemporary art from Mexico has been trapped within the “fantastic” realm afforded to Latin American art as a whole. The formation of the Latin American Arts Association of Great Britain in 1983 is a recent example of how some have attempted to “provide a platform for the promotion of Latin American culture.”3 The 1987 exhibition “Art of the Fantastic: Latin America, 1920-1987,” organized by the Indianapolis Museum of Art, is one incident to grow out of the Latin American Arts Association. What is of particular interest here is the juxtaposition of the notion that Latin American art is “‘fantastic,’ ‘primitive,’ or ‘colorful’”4 with Mexico’s own contemporary art scene of the late-1980s and 1990s. While some artists created works that directly embodied this stereotype, other artists retreated and decidedly dealt with subjects that rejected it. Mexican art produced during this period may be broadly categorized into two tendencies: the neo-Mexicanists and their opposing counterpart. Neo-Mexicanist works reflect the pre-conceived “fantastic” notions of the land and its people; the subjects of such artworks include an idea of Mexicanness, incorporating pyramids, sarapes, La Virgen, and other stereotyped subjects. As Teresa