Documents of 20Th-Century Latin American and Latino Art a DIGITAL ARCHIVE and PUBLICATIONS PROJECT at the MUSEUM of FINE ARTS, HOUSTON

International Center for the Arts of the Americas at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston Documents of 20th-century Latin American and Latino Art A DIGITAL ARCHIVE AND PUBLICATIONS PROJECT AT THE MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS, HOUSTON

ICAA Record ID: 1065622 Access Date: 2017-08-18

Bibliographic Citation: Mosquera, Gerardo. “From Latin American Art to Art from Latin America.” ArtNexus (Bogotá, Colombia), no. 48 (April- June 2003): 70- 74.

WARNING: This document is protected by copyright. All rights reserved. Reproduction Synopsis: or downloading for personal Gerardo Mosquera considers the usefulness of the idea of Latin American art, ultimately taking a use or inclusion of any portion firm position against it as it has been understood up to now. He begins by describing Latin of this document in another work intended for commercial American culture’s “neurosis of identity” as the inevitable result of its complex history of cultural purpose will require permission and ethnic intermingling, colonialism, and oppositional relationships with Europe and the United from the copyright owner(s). States. Mosquera warns of the “traps” into which Latin American art is apt to fall with the ADVERTENCIA: Este docu- globalization of art and culture, even though, thanks to globalization it is increasingly visible in mento está protegido bajo la ley de derechos de autor. Se the so-called mainstream. In this context, Latin American art that insists on its identity as such is reservan todos los derechos. in jeopardy of, among other things, 1) becoming a postmodern “cliché,” 2) being seen as Su reproducción o descarga derivative of art produced in Western centers, and 3) of “self-exoticism.” Instead, Mosquera para uso personal o la inclusión de cualquier parte de este argues that Latin American artists should be understood as part of what he calls a “third scene,” documento en otra obra con in which difference and displacement is accepted as an inherent aspect of globalization. Artists propósitos comerciales re- in Latin America have furthermore, he argues, been forced to produce art “on the rebound,” querirá permiso de quien(es) detenta(n) dichos derechos. responding to mainstream ways of making art with results that ultimately transform the very

Please note that the layout frameworks of the mainstream. In conclusion, Mosquera calls for more “horizontal” contact of certain documents on this between Latin American countries, and characterizes the most relevant contemporary art of website may have been modi- Latin America as that which has participated in “. . . the global development of . . . a minimal and fied for readability purposes. In such cases, please refer to conceptual international, postmodern language.” the first page of the document for its original design.

Por favor, tenga en cuenta que el diseño de ciertos documentos en este sitio web pueden haber sido modificados para mejorar su legibilidad. En estos casos, consulte la primera página del documento para ver International Center for the Arts of the Americas | The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston el diseño original. P.O. Box 6826, Houston, TX 77265-6826 | http://icaadocs.mfah.org From Latin American Art to Art from Latin America

al entity misnamed Latin America is maintained, but problematical. Mu- dimbe's question, "What is Africa?"4 is increasingly valid if we transfer it to our region. What is Latin America? It is, among other things, an invention that we can reinvent. pi The generalized continuance of this recognition may appear strange, since I ...1.....1. r we as Latin Americans have always --,,A asked ourselves who we really are. It is I _Pry f,it Z74''-...:,''' difficult to know given the multiplicity of components in our ethno-genesis, the 1 complex processes of creolization and hybridization, and the presence of large groups of indigenous peoples who are excluded or only partially integrated into postcolonial nationalities. We have to add the impact of vast immigrations of Europeans and Asians throughout II the twentieth century, and the strong emigrations within the continent and Wilfredo Prieto. Apolitic, 2001. Black and white flags and flagpoles. Variable dimensions. toward the United States and Europe, principally in the final part of that cen- GERARDO MOSQUERAwhy do we not do so with indigenoustury and until today. Such an intricate peoples north of the Rio Grande? Isplot is further complicated by a very Culture in Latin America has sufferedwhat we call Latin America part of theearly colonial history, somewhere be- from a neurosis of identity that is notWest or the non-West? Does this con-tween the medieval and renaissance completely cured, and of which this texttradict both, emphasizing the schema-eras, with, from the outset, a permanent forms a part, be it in opposition. I couldtization of such notions? In any case,and massive settlement of Iberians and attest to it when in 1996 I published antoday the United States, with more thanAfricans. At the same time, and as a re- article entitled El arte latinoamericanothirty million inhabitants of "Hispan-sult of the pressure to enhance or to deja de serlo (Latin American Art Ceasesic" origin, is without doubt one of thebuild identities of resistance in the face to be Latin American Art),' which pro-most actively Latin American countries.of Europe and United States, we have voked strong reactions. Nevertheless,Given the migratory boom and thebeen inclined to define a Latin Ameri- by the end of the 1970s Federico Mo-growth rate of the "Hispanic" popula-can self by means of all-encompassing rais had linked our identity obsessiontion (migration without movement), ingeneralizations, which have coexisted with colonialism, and proposed a "plu-a not so distant future, the U.S. maywith the fragmentation imposed by na- ral, diverse, and multifaceted" idea ofcome to have the third largest Spanish-tionalisms. There are many answers to the continent,2 a product of its multi-speaking population, after Mexico andthe question, perhaps not yet well out- plicity of origin. Yet the very notions ofSpain. In some stores in Miami there arelined, of whether we are Western or not, Latin America and Iberoamerica havesigns that say "English Spoken." African or not. Our labyrinths have con- always been very problematic. Do they Nevertheless, just as the idea of Af-fused or intoxicated us. We are now include the Dutch and Anglo Caribbe-rica is considered by some African in-beginning to situate ourselves more an? Chicanos? Do they embrace indig-tellectuals to be a colonial invention,within the fragment, juxtaposition, and enous peoples who often do not eventhe idea of Latin America has not yetcollage, accepting our diversity at the speak European languages? If we rec-been discarded.3 The self-conscious-same time as our contradictions. The ognize the latter as Latin Americans,ness of belonging to a historical-cultur-danger is that of coining, against mod-

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One could outline a historical perspective that runs perhaps from "provincial European art" to "derivative art" to "Latin American art" to "art in Latin America" to "art from Latin America." I do not refer to the character of this production in different historical moments, but to the prevalent epistemologies. The last of these terms emphasizes on the active participation of art in "international" circuits and languages.

ernist totalizations, a postmodern clichéa result, some artists are inclined towardspractice that does not by necessity of Latin America as a realm ofheteroge- "otherizing" themselves, in a paradox ofshow its context, and that on occasion neity.5 On the other hand, pluralism canself-exoticism, which becomes increas-refers to art itself. This corresponds to become a prison without walls. Borgesingly indirect and sophisticated. Thethe increase of new international cir- told the story of the best labyrinth: theparadox is still more apparent if we askcuits that are slowly overcoming the immensurable amplitude of the desert,ourselves why the "Other" is alwayspseudo-internationalism of the main- from which it is difficult to escape. Plu-ourselves, never them. Self-exoticism re-stream. The consolidation of this ralism in the abstract, or controlled byveals a hegemonic structure, but also the"third" scene is part and parcel of the the self-decentralized centers, maypassivity of the artist, of being compla-processes of globalization. In this way, weave a labyrinth of indeterminationcent at all costs, or at most indicates aartists from Latin America, like those that limits the possibilities of a sociallyscant initiative. Moreover, this has beenof Africa or Southeast Asia, have be- and culturally active diversification.perpetrated by local positions that con-gun, slowly and yet increasingly, to Borges can perhaps offer us another key:front foreign intrusion. I refer to nation-exhibit, publish, and exercise influence upon conclusion of the obligation ofalist mythologies where a traditionalist

drawing each and every one of our di-cult of the "roots" is expressed, suppos- Jorge Macchi. Intimacy, 2001. Installation. versities, perhaps only a portrait of eachedly protecting against foreign interfer- 74 3/4 x 11 3/4x 3 in. (190 x 30 x 8 cm.). draftsman will appear. ences, and the romantic idealization of Courtesy: Galeria Luisa Strina. Another trap is the assumption thatconventions about history and the val- Latin American art is simply derivativeues of the nation. Frequently nationalis- of the Western centers, without consid-tic folklorism is to a large extent used or ering its complicated relationship in themanipulated by power to rhetoricize a gra more and more problematic notion ofso-called integrated, participative na- West. Frequently the works are not evention. In this way the real exclusion of looked at: passports are requested be-popular strata, especially that of indige- forehand, and baggage is checked un-nous peoples, is disguised. This situation rPrifiErBOWilit der the suspicion of contraband fromthus circumscribes art within ghettoized New York, London, or Berlin. Often theparameters of circulation, publication, passports are not in order since theyand consumption that immediately limit respond to processes of hybridizationits possibilities of diffusion and legitima- and appropriation, the result of a longcy and reduce it to predetermined fields. and multifaceted postcolonial situation. When I said that Latin American art Their pages appear full of the re-signi-was ceasing to be Latin American art, fications, reinventions, "contamina-I was referring to two processes that I tions"6 and "incorrections"7 that haveobserve on the continent. One is locat- been in evidence from the times of ba-ed in the sphere of artistic production, roque artyet more so in our own ep-and the other in that of circulation and och, which is marked by so muchreception. On the one hand, there is the cultural transformation and the hybrid-internal process of overcoming the ization in which complex re-adapta-neurosis of identity among artists, crit- tions of identities occur while bordersics, and curators. This brings with it a mutate and become porous. tranquility that permits greater inter- The new fascination for alteration isnalization in artistic discourse. On the specific to the "global" fad, and has per-other hand, Latin American art is be- LatIonlillio mitted greater circulation and legitimiza- ginning to be valued as an art without tion of art from the peripheries. But allsurnames. Instead of demanding that too often only those works that explicit- it declare its identity, art from Latin ly manifest difference or satisfy expec-America is now being recognized more 1,1110100014 tations of exoticism are legitimated. Asand more as a participant in a general

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1065622 This electronic version © 2015 ICAA | MFAH [3/6] is an identity disinterested in "identity," an identity through action, not through iA mowv/ 1171.400.tf. P.C. ii4114 1.0,1,F W.,, r4440 Has& LA r representation. rev. I i /TAMP44, OV LA. 0 tor 011.,1 . . 0,noArn- P. MO 4.C.P.ll. 4,101,4A. By virtue of the characteristics of an NOloAwbk LA ' aphe 2 Jed. fu,pg.fe,CA7.4, early colonization that Europeanized I Irpol IA(K( P. 1.1.c'eltAt.I. I1iff A. CA r this vast area, the culture of Latin 04410 E.:11s.s:. g I. ,1 01.0.4 ! America, and especially that of the vi- ;7141t sual arts, has frequently played on the tiff.:,';` ,. ..4..'".. ^..--.... rebound. That is to say, artists have el* returned the balls that arrived from the North, appropriating hegemonic ten- -.771, dencies and thus turning them into their own individual creativities within the complexity of their context. Crit- ical discourses have emphasized such strategies of re-signification, transformation, and syncretism in order to con-

Priscilla Monge. Pensum, 1999-2000. Installation. Blackboard and white chalk. Variable dimensions. front the constant accusation of being Work presented during ARCO Madrid, Spain, 2002. Courtesy: Jacob Karpio Gallery. copycats and derivatives that, not without reason, we have suffered from outside of ghettoized circuits. As a re- The question in its entirety is more(in fact, only the Japanese surpass us sult of this, many prejudices are con-complex. Take the case of a good partin the art of copying). Postmodernity, fronted and everybody wins, not onlyof Brazilian art. One could describe thewith its discrediting of originality and those circles with less access to inter-principal tendency in its practice to beits validation of the copy has been of national networks. the development of a neo-concrete, postgreat help to us. But equally plausible However, new problems have emer-minimal inclination, directed towardswould be the displacements of focus ged, characteristic of a period of tran-a mainstream without a local base orthat would recognize how Latin Amer- sition. If the danger of self-exoticisman interest in popular culture. But, asican art has enriched the framework of in response to the expectation ofthe critic Paulo Emilio Sales Gómezthe "international" from within. For "primitivism" and difference exists, itscaricatured it, the good fortune of Bra-example, José Clemente Orozco is al- opposites also exist: abstract cosmo-zilians is that they copied badly,' creat-ways analyzed within the context of politanism that flattens out differences,ing a particular way of speaking theMexican muralism. It would be much and the mimetic "internationalism""international language." Howevermore productive to see him as one of that forces the appropriation of a typepolemic it may be, Sales Gómez'sthe key figures of Expressionism, as he of international postmodern language,schematization is rich in meanings. Ifis without doubt. Although Wifredo much like an "English of art" that func-Brazilian art, like the mistaken dove ofLam is considered to have introduced tions like the lingua franca of the in-Rafael Alberti, desired to go north butspecific elements of African origin to creasingly numerous biennales andwent south, in the end it is less aboutSurrealism, only recently has he been internationalexhibitions.8The fact thatdisorientation than de-orientation. Suchrecognized for having used modern- artistsfrom all corners of the globea dynamic has allowed Brazilian artistsism as a space for the expression of now exhibit internationally only sig-a highly original participation within anAfrican-Caribbean content, thus af- nifies a quantitative internationaliza-"international" post-minimal, concep-firming an anti-hegemonic position. tion. The question remains: to whattual tendency. They have charged it with It is problematic that dominant cen- extent are the artists contributing toan expressivity that is almost existential,ters always get the kick-off. One cannot transformation of the hegemonic andshattering a prevailing, tedious coldness,continually move in the same North- restrictive status quo in favor of trueand have introduced sophistication intoSouth direction according to the domi- diversification, instead of being man- the material itself and at the same time anant power structure. No matter how aged by it? The Brazilian modernistshuman proximity towards it. They havevalid a different and opposing trans-cul- used the metaphor of antropofagia indiversified, made more complex and yettural strategy might be within the dom- order to legitimize their critical appro-subverted the practice of this "interna-inant structure, it implicates a perennial priation of European artistic tenden-tional language." The personality of thiscondition of response that reproduces cies, a procedure characteristic ofanti-samba aesthetic is not producedthis hegemony. This stands even if it con- postcolonial art. But we must qualifyas frequently occurs among Caribbeanstests this structure and still manages to this process to break with connotationsand Andinosthrough representationstake advantage of it much in the man- that make the battle that this relation-or important activation of vernacularner of the martial arts in which, without ship implicitly carriesof who swal-culture, but rather through a specificthe use of their arms, contenders avail lows whomtransparent. manner of making contemporary art. ltthemselves of the strength of a more

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1065622 This electronic version © 2015 ICAA | MFAH [4/6] powerful opponent. It is equally neces-generalizations that are still recognizedexpanding its capacity for dense and sary to invert the direction of the cur-as depictions of a slippery Latin Amer-refined meaning. These artists are rent, not by reversing a binary schemeican cultural identity, or of some regionsstrengthening the analytic and linguis- of transference but rather by contribut-in particular: magic realism, the mar-tic tools of post conceptualism in or- ing to pluralization in order to enrichvelous (both related to the surrealistder to struggle with the complexity of and transform the existing situation. Aproclamation about Latin Americasociety and culture in Latin America, horizontal, South-South volley wouldmade by And ré Breton in Mexico), mes-where multiplicity, hybridization, and also be welcome, tending toward thetizaje (miscegenation), the baroque, thecontrasts have introduced contradic- development of a truly global networkconstructive impulse, revolutionarytions as well as subtleties. of interactions on all sides. Cultural ex-discourse, etc. These categories, how- This plan contradicts a certain "mili- changes within globalization still appearever justified, served the efforts of "re-tant" tradition of Latin American art, in to be laid out from the centers in a radial sistance" against "imperialist" culturalfavor of another very different tradition schema, with insufficient connections. Apenetration. They had a notable rise inof fluidity and complexity in the man- structure of axial globalization with itsthe 1960s within a militant Latin Amer-ner in which the culture of the conti- zones of silence, designs economic, po-icanism that was characteristic of thenent has actively dealt with the social litical, and cultural circuits that macro-historical period marked by the Cubanproblem. The former operates with conform the entire planet. GlobalizationRevolution and guerrilla movements.greater clarity on the plane of the signi- has speeded up and pluralized culturalHowever, those ideologies came tofied than on that of its signifiers and is circulation, but has done so following theover-construct the categories with a to-in keeping with contemporary practic- structure of the economy, reproducingtalizing effect, so that they became ste-es in other peripheral areas. Moreover, in a certain measure its structures ofreotypes for the outside gaze. To speakit has to do with a projection that is power. Hence the difficulty of achievingof magic realism or miscegenation asmore individual and derivative of the the modifications in the flows to whichglobal etiquettes today sounds almostartist himself, than with any partisan- I have referred, since the currents usual-like an El Zorro movie. ship or militant sense that places art in ly move according to where the money Latin America has participated in thea position subordinate to political and is. Fortunately, the processes of interna-global development of what we couldsocial discourses that tend to endow art tionalization that globalization has trig-schematize as a minimal and concep-with a merely illustrative function. gered appear to lead us graduallytual "international, postmodern lan- toward a more fluid cultural interaction.guage." But to a considerable extent it We are living through a slippery mo-has done so in its own manner, and by Doris Salcedo. Untitled, 2001. Wood, concrete, glass, fabric and steel. 80 x 67 x 50 in. ment of transition, a post-utopian epochintroducing differences. Many artists (203,5 x 170 x 120 cm.). Courtesy:Alexander and that seeks changes within existing struc-work as much "toward the inside" as Bonin, New York and White Cube, London. tures rather than changing the structures"toward the outside" of the art, using themselves. post-conceptual resources in order to When I stated that the best thing thatintegrate the aesthetic, the social, the was happening to Latin American artcultural, the historic, and the religious ' was that it was ceasing to be Latinwithout sacrificing specific artistic re- American art, I was also referring tosearch. We might say that in reality the problematic totalization that thethey are empowering artistic discourse term carries. Some writers prefer toby taking it into new territories and speak of "art in Latin America" instead of "Latin American art," as a de-emphasizing convention that tries to un- derline, on the very level of language, its rejection of the suspicious construction of an integral, emblematic Latin America, and beyond this, of any glo- balizing generalization. To stop being "Latin American art" means to dis- tance oneself from a simplified notion of art in Latin America and to highlight the extraordinary variety of symbolic production on the continent. Art in Latin America has been inter- mittently displacing the paradigms that had guided its practice and valuation. These paradigms were related to certain

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Waltercio Caldas. Yellow (), 2002. Stainless steel, vynil and enamel. Glenda Orta. Choosing Simultaneity, 2002. Televisions placed on 24 x 36 V, x 6 in. (60 x 93 x 15 cm.). Courtesy: Christopher Grimes Gallery. building windows.

This difference in terms of meaninges in Latin America. These tended tonew cultural subjects in an internation- is one of the changes enacted with re-accentuate a contrary direction, that isal arena that until recently was under spect to the totalizing paradigms toto say, the manner in which art corre-lock and chain. We cannot say that this which I have referred; such paradigmssponded to an already given nationalarena is now open, but that it does procured a characteristically Latinculture. Artists worked, to a certain ex-have more doors, and that these can American language right from the start.tent, to legitimize themselves within thebe opened with different kinds of keys. These new artists seem less interestedframework of a prevailing nationalism in showing their passport. Culturalto which they contributed. Beyond this*Translated from Spanish by Michele components act more within the con-confrontation, context is a basic factorFaguet. text of discourse than visually, even inin the works of the artists who have es- cases in which these were based upontablished a new perspective that, more NOTES the vernacular. This does not mean thatthan representing contexts, constructs 1. Gerardo Mosquera, "El arte latinoamericano deja de there is no Latin American look in theworksfrom them. Physical and cultural serlo," ARCO Latino, Madrid, 1996, pp 7-10. 2. Frederico Morais, Las Artes Plásticas en la América work of numerous artists, or even thatidentities and social environments are Latina: del Trance a lo Transitorio, Casa de las Ameri- one cannot point to certain identifying performedmore than being merely rep- cas, Havana, 119791 1990, pp 4-5. traits of some countries or areas. Whatresented. They are in fact identities and 3. Olu Oguibe, "In the Heart of Darkness," Third Text, is crucial is the fact that these identitiescontexts concurrent in the "internation- no. 23, Summer 1993, pp 3-8. begin to manifest themselves more byal" meta-language of the arts and in the 4. V.Y.Mudimbe, The Invention of Africa, (Indiana University Press, Bloomington and Indianapolis), 1988. their features as an artistic practice thandiscussion of contemporary global 5. Mánica Amor, "Cartographies: Exploring the by their use of identifying elements tak-themes. Limitations of a Curatorial Paradigm," Beyond the en from folklore, religion, the physical In a departure from the previous dis- Fantastic. Contemporary Art Criticism from Latin America, environment, or history This develop-cussion, one could outline a historical ed. Gerardo Mosquera, (Institute of International Visual ment implies the presence of the con-perspective that runs perhaps from Arts, London/MIT Press, Cambridge), 1995. 6. Jean Fisher, "Editorial: Some Thoughts on 'Contamina- text and of culture understood in its"provincial European art" to "deriva- tions,'" Third Text London, no. 32,Autumn 1995, pp 3-7. broadest meaning, and internalized intive art" to "Latin American art" to "art 7. Boris Bernstein, "Algunas consideraciones en rela- the very manner of constructing worksin Latin America" to "art from Latin ción con el problema 'arte y etnos," Criterios, Havana, or discourses. But it also implies praxisAmerica." I do not refer to the charac- nos. 5-12, January 1983-December 1984, p 267. of art itself, insofar as art establishester of this production in different his- 8. Gerardo Mosquera, "tLenguaje internacional?" La- piz, Madrid, no. 121, April 1996, pp 12-15. identifiable constants by delineatingtorical moments, but to the prevalent 9. Ana Maria de Moraes Belluzzo in conversation with cultural typologies in the very processepistemologies. The last of these terms the author. of making art, rather than merely ac-emphasizes the active participation of 10. Thus the subtitle of my anthology from 1995. centuating cultural factors interjectedart in "international" circuits and lan- 11. The insistence of quotation marks stresses the into it. Thus, much Brazilian art is iden- reductive meaning within which it is still appropriate guages.'° It refers to an intervention to use this term. tifiable more by the manner in which itthat brings with it anti-homogenizing refers to ways of making art than justdifferences and its legitimization with- projecting contexts. in the "international"" arena. That is GERARDO MOSQUERA To emphasize the practice of art as theto say, it identifies the construction of Cuban Art Historian, Curator and Critic. He creator of cultural difference confrontsthe global from the position of differ- currently works as curator for the New the orientation of modernist discours-ence, underlining the appearance of Museum of Contemporary Art, New York.

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