UC Santa Cruz UC Santa Cruz Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title Treasures and Splendors: Exhibiting Colonial Latin American Art in U.S. Museums, 1920- 2020 Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/8rv8774d Author Hobart, Aubrey Publication Date 2018 License https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 4.0 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA SANTA CRUZ TREASURES AND SPLENDORS: EXHIBITING COLONIAL LATIN AMERICAN ART IN U.S. MUSEUMS, 1920-2020 A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in VISUAL STUDIES by Aubrey Hobart June 2018 The Dissertation of Aubrey Hobart is approved: ____________________________________ Professor Carolyn Dean, chair ____________________________________ Professor Elisabeth Cameron ____________________________________ Associate Professor James Córdova ____________________________________ Donna Pierce, PhD. _______________________________ Tyrus Miller Vice Provost and Dean of Graduate Studies Copyright © by Aubrey Hobart 2018 TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT ........................................................................................................................ iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................................................................ vii INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................ 1 On Terms ......................................................................................................................... 2 Dissertation Goals and Methods ...................................................................................... 22 1920-1959: MEXICAN ART AS DIPLOMACY ................................................................ 31 The Roaring Twenties..................................................................................................... 32 The Threadbare Thirties .................................................................................................. 40 Mexican Oil and Alphabet Soup ..................................................................................... 50 A Bit of Mexican Flavor ................................................................................................. 57 South of U.S. .................................................................................................................. 77 After the War (I Went Back to New York) ...................................................................... 81 1960-1979: SMUGGLING, STRUGGLING, AND ONIONS.............................................. 85 Mrs. Freyer Goes to Peru ................................................................................................ 87 Art Therapy .................................................................................................................. 100 Civil Rights and Civil Wars .......................................................................................... 115 More Problems with Petrol ........................................................................................... 118 A New Professionalism ................................................................................................ 125 1980-1999: CULTURE FOR SALE .................................................................................. 130 Banking on Art ............................................................................................................. 132 Mickey Mouse’s Mexico .............................................................................................. 135 Selling Out ................................................................................................................... 155 Free Trade and the Lost Decade .................................................................................... 158 The Miseries of Thirsty Centuries ................................................................................. 163 Columbus Lost the Culture Wars .................................................................................. 179 Converging in Brooklyn ............................................................................................... 185 2000-2020: THE SCHOLARLY SHOWS ......................................................................... 193 Blockbuster Remix (Feat. Media Corporations and National Governments) .................. 195 Collectors: The Next Generation ................................................................................... 207 The Collector Show Remastered ................................................................................... 226 The New Exhibitions .................................................................................................... 236 What the Future Holds .................................................................................................. 242 CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................ 244 FIGURES ......................................................................................................................... 256 APPENDIX A: CAA CATEGORIES ............................................................................... 265 Existing Categories ....................................................................................................... 265 Possible Alternate Categories........................................................................................ 266 APPENDIX B: COLONIAL LATIN AMERICAN ART EXHIBITS, 1920-2020 .............. 270 APPENDIX C: CROCKER ART MUSEUM SURVEY, JANUARY 2017........................ 275 BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................ 284 iii ABSTRACT Treasures and Splendors: Exhibiting Colonial Latin American Art in U.S. Museums, 1920-2020 Aubrey Hobart Over the last century, art museums in the United States have mounted dozens of exhibitions of Colonial Latin American art, but their reasons for doing so have changed over time. Most of the exhibits from 1920-1959 played an important role in international diplomacy as the U.S. government attempted to influence Americans’ attitudes about Latin Americans, and vice versa, for economic and political gains. However, government interest largely waned in the 1960s and ‘70s, leaving a power vacuum that was filled by individual art collectors, who became the tastemakers of the era. This was financially unsustainable, though, and by the 1980s and ‘90s, major conglomerates began to convert their fiscal power into charitable goodwill by sponsoring crowd-pleasing blockbuster exhibitions. Yet for all these shifts, the most rapid changes in American society came after the turn of the millennia with the rise of the internet and an increase in international terrorism. As technology and social pressures have combined to make the past more accessible and desirable, there has been an increase in the number of museum exhibitions and reasons for their existence. The last two decades have seen exhibits produced on behalf of national governments, wealthy art collectors, and corporate entities, but now they tend to be more driven by scholarship and academic interests, as well. iv While this project is interested in tracking and documenting these changes over time, its focus on the relatively small number of exhibitions of Colonial Latin American art in the United States over the last hundred years serves a greater goal; the questions it asks are more philosophical. What role does the museum play in society? What happens to public opinion when trusted and authoritative institutions forward specific visions of culture and cultural production? Whose voice is really being heard and assimilated? Although I cannot offer definitive answers to these questions, this project does ultimately suggest that museums do not simply reflect popular notions about other cultures, but in fact play major roles in constructing those opinions. Even though the vast majority of the population will never see any given exhibition—let alone read every label, peruse all wall text, or study every item displayed—museums, often subtly, sometimes overtly, exert influence by drawing attention to specific cultures and histories, and by privileging particular perspectives. The ways influence has been manifested in and through museum exhibitions are the topic of this study; also under consideration are the consequences of the kind of work museums have done and might possibly do in the future. v vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS In deep gratitude, I would like to recognize the contributions of the following individuals and organizations for their generous assistance in the completion of this dissertation: Susan Solt, UCSC Dean of the Arts, for offering financial aid in the form of an Arts Division Summer Fellowship (2017) and a Dissertation Fellowship (2018); Maria Evangelatou, Jennifer Gonzalez, Stacy Kamehiro, Ruby Lipsenthal, and the other UCSC Visual Studies faculty and staff who were so generous with their advice, encouragement, and time; The UCSC Visual Studies department in general for several travel grants and a Dissertation Fellowship (2017); The museum professionals who kindly shared their time and expertise, including: - Marcus Burke, Senior Curator of Paintings, Drawings, and Metalwork at the Hispanic Society of America, - Chelsea Dacus, Assistant