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Documents of 20th-centuryLatin American and Latino ArtA DIGITAL ARCHIVE AND PUBLICATIONS PROJECT AT THE MUSEUM OF FINE ARTS, HOUSTON

International Center for the Arts of the Americas | The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston

P.O. Box , Houston, TX | http://icaadocs.mfah.org

International Center for the Arts of the Americas at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston

ICAA Record ID: 1065622

Access Date: 2013-08-18

Bibliographic Citation:

Mosquera, Gerardo. “Del Arte Latinoamericano al arte desde América Latina.” ArtNexus 48

(April 2003): n.p.

Synopsis:

Gerardo Mosquera considers the usefulness of the idea of Latin American art, ultimately taking a

firm position against it as it has been understood up to now. He begins by describing Latin

American culture’s “neurosis of identity” as the inevitable result of its complex history of cultural

and ethnic intermingling, colonialism, and oppositional relationships with Europe and the United

States. Mosquera warns of the “traps” into which Latin American art is apt to fall with the

globalization of art and culture, even though, thanks to globalization it is increasingly visible in

the so-called mainstream. In this context, Latin American art that insists on its identity as such is

in jeopardy of, among other things, 1) becoming a postmodern “cliché,” 2) being seen as

derivative of art produced in Western centers, and 3) of “self-exoticism.” Instead, Mosquera

argues that Latin American artists should be understood as part of what he calls a “third scene,”

in which difference and displacement is accepted as an inherent aspect of globalization. Artists

in Latin America have furthermore, he argues, been forced to produce art “on the rebound,”

responding to mainstream ways of making art with results that ultimately transform the very

frameworks of the mainstream. In conclusion, Mosquera calls for more “horizontal” contact

between Latin American countries, and characterizes the most relevant contemporary art of

Latin America as that which has participated in “. . . the global development of . . . a minimal and

conceptual international, postmodern language.”



From Latin American Art

to Art from Latin America

Wilfredo Prieto. Apolitic, 2001. Black and white flags and flagpoles. Variable dimensions.

GERARDO MOSQUERA

Culture in Latin America has suffered

from a neurosis of identity that is notcompletely cured, and of which this text

forms a part, be it in opposition. I could

attest to it when in 1996 I published an

article entitled El arte latinoamericanodeja de serlo (Latin American Art Ceases

to be Latin American Art),' which pro-

voked strong reactions. Nevertheless,by the end of the 1970s Federico Mo-

rais had linked our identity obsessionwith colonialism, and proposed a "plu-

ral, diverse, and multifaceted" idea ofthe continent,2 a product of its multi-plicity of origin. Yet the very notions of

Latin America and Iberoamerica havealways been very problematic. Do they

include the Dutch and Anglo Caribbe-

an? Chicanos? Do they embrace indig-

enous peoples who often do not evenspeak European languages? If we rec-ognize the latter as Latin Americans,

70 ARTNEXus

why do we not do so with indigenous

peoples north of the Rio Grande? Iswhat we call Latin America part of the

West or the non-West? Does this con-tradict both, emphasizing the schema-tization of such notions? In any case,today the United States, with more than

thirty million inhabitants of "Hispan-ic" origin, is without doubt one of themost actively Latin American countries.

Given the migratory boom and thegrowth rate of the "Hispanic" popula-tion (migration without movement), in

a not so distant future, the U.S. may

come to have the third largest Spanish-speaking population, after Mexico and

Spain. In some stores in Miami there are

signs that say "English Spoken."Nevertheless, just as the idea of Af-

rica is considered by some African in-

tellectuals to be a colonial invention,the idea of Latin America has not yetbeen discarded.3 The self-conscious-ness of belonging to a historical-cultur-

al entity misnamed Latin America ismaintained, but problematical. Mu-dimbe's question, "What is Africa?"4

is increasingly valid if we transfer it to

our region. What is Latin America? Itis, among other things, an inventionthat we can reinvent.

The generalized continuance of thisrecognition may appear strange, sincewe as Latin Americans have alwaysasked ourselves who we really are. It is

difficult to know given the multiplicity

of components in our ethno-genesis, thecomplex processes of creolization andhybridization, and the presence of large

groups of indigenous peoples who are

excluded or only partially integratedinto postcolonial nationalities. We have

to add the impact of vast immigrations

of Europeans and Asians throughoutthe twentieth century, and the strongemigrations within the continent andtoward the United States and Europe,principally in the final part of that cen-

tury and until today. Such an intricate

plot is further complicated by a veryearly colonial history, somewhere be-tween the medieval and renaissanceeras, with, from the outset, a permanent

and massive settlement of Iberians and

Africans. At the same time, and as a re-

sult of the pressure to enhance or tobuild identities of resistance in the face

of Europe and United States, we havebeen inclined to define a Latin Ameri-

can self by means of all-encompassing

generalizations, which have coexisted

with the fragmentation imposed by na-

tionalisms. There are many answers tothe question, perhaps not yet well out-

lined, of whether we are Western or not,

African or not. Our labyrinths have con-

fused or intoxicated us. We are nowbeginning to situate ourselves morewithin the fragment, juxtaposition, and

collage, accepting our diversity at the

same time as our contradictions. Thedanger is that of coining, against mod-

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1065622 This electronic version © 2012 ICAA | MFAH



ESSAY

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 cliché

of Latin America as a realm of heteroge-

neity.5 On the other hand, pluralism can

become a prison without walls. Borges

told the story of the best labyrinth: the

immensurable amplitude of the desert,

from which it is difficult to escape. Plu-

ralism in the abstract, or controlled by

the self-decentralized centers, mayweave a labyrinth of indetermination

that limits the possibilities of a sociallyand culturally active diversification.Borges can perhaps offer us another key:

upon conclusion of the obligation ofdrawing each and every one of our di-

versities, perhaps only a portrait of each

draftsman will appear.

Another trap is the assumption thatLatin American art is simply derivative

of the Western centers, without consid-

ering its complicated relationship in the

more and more problematic notion ofWest. Frequently the works are not even

looked at: passports are requested be-forehand, and baggage is checked un-

der the suspicion of contraband fromNew York, London, or Berlin. Often the

passports are not in order since theyrespond to processes of hybridizationand appropriation, the result of a long

and multifaceted postcolonial situation.

Their pages appear full of the re-signi-

fications, reinventions, "contamina-tions"6 and "incorrections"7 that havebeen in evidence from the times of ba-

roque artyet more so in our own ep-och, which is marked by so much

cultural transformation and the hybrid-ization in which complex re-adapta-tions of identities occur while borders

mutate and become porous.

The new fascination for alteration isspecific to the "global" fad, and has per-

mitted greater circulation and legitimiza-

tion of art from the peripheries. But all

too often only those works that explicit-

ly manifest difference or satisfy expec-

tations of exoticism are legitimated. As

a result, some artists are inclined towards

"otherizing" themselves, in a paradox of

self-exoticism, which becomes increas-

ingly indirect and sophisticated. Theparadox is still more apparent if we ask

ourselves why the "Other" is alwaysourselves, never them. Self-exoticism re-

veals a hegemonic structure, but also the

passivity of the artist, of being compla-

cent at all costs, or at most indicates a

scant initiative. Moreover, this has beenperpetrated by local positions that con-

front foreign intrusion. I refer to nation-

alist mythologies where a traditionalist

cult of the "roots" is expressed, suppos-

edly protecting against foreign interfer-

ences, and the romantic idealization of

conventions about history and the val-

ues of the nation. Frequently nationalis-

tic folklorism is to a large extent used or

manipulated by power to rhetoricize aso-called integrated, participative na-tion. In this way the real exclusion of

popular strata, especially that of indige-

nous peoples, is disguised. This situation

thus circumscribes art within ghettoized

parameters of circulation, publication,and consumption that immediately limit

its possibilities of diffusion and legitima-

cy and reduce it to predetermined fields.

When I said that Latin American artwas ceasing to be Latin American art,

I was referring to two processes that I

observe on the continent. One is locat-

ed in the sphere of artistic production,

and the other in that of circulation and

reception. On the one hand, there is the

internal process of overcoming theneurosis of identity among artists, crit-ics, and curators. This brings with it a

tranquility that permits greater inter-nalization in artistic discourse. On theother hand, Latin American art is be-ginning to be valued as an art withoutsurnames. Instead of demanding thatit declare its identity, art from LatinAmerica is now being recognized more

and more as a participant in a general

practice that does not by necessityshow its context, and that on occasionrefers to art itself. This corresponds tothe increase of new international cir-cuits that are slowly overcoming thepseudo-internationalism of the main-stream. The consolidation of this"third" scene is part and parcel of theprocesses of globalization. In this way,

artists from Latin America, like those

of Africa or Southeast Asia, have be-gun, slowly and yet increasingly, toexhibit, publish, and exercise influence

Jorge Macchi. Intimacy, 2001. Installation.

74 3/4 x 11 3/4x 3 in. (190 x 30 x 8 cm.).

Courtesy: Galeria Luisa Strina.

ARTNEXUS 71

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Priscilla Monge. Pensum, 1999-2000. Installation. Blackboard and white chalk. Variable dimensions.

Work presented during ARCO Madrid, Spain, 2002. Courtesy: Jacob Karpio Gallery.

outside of ghettoized circuits. As a re-

sult of this, many prejudices are con-fronted and everybody wins, not onlythose circles with less access to inter-national networks.

However, new problems have emer-ged, characteristic of a period of tran-sition. If the danger of self-exoticismin response to the expectation of"primitivism" and difference exists, its

opposites also exist: abstract cosmo-politanism that flattens out differences,

and the mimetic "internationalism"that forces the appropriation of a type

of international postmodern language,much like an "English of art" that func-

tions like the lingua franca of the in-creasingly numerous biennales andinternational exhibitions.8 The fact that

artists from all corners of the globenow exhibit internationally only sig-nifies a quantitative internationaliza-tion. The question remains: to whatextent are the artists contributing totransformation of the hegemonic andrestrictive status quo in favor of truediversification, instead of being man-

aged by it? The Brazilian modernistsused the metaphor of antropofagia inorder to legitimize their critical appro-

priation of European artistic tenden-cies, a procedure characteristic ofpostcolonial art. But we must qualifythis process to break with connotations

that make the battle that this relation-ship implicitly carriesof who swal-lows whomtransparent.

72 ARTNEXUS

The question in its entirety is more

complex. Take the case of a good partof Brazilian art. One could describe the

principal tendency in its practice to be

the development of a neo-concrete, post

minimal inclination, directed towardsa mainstream without a local base oran interest in popular culture. But, asthe critic Paulo Emilio Sales Gómezcaricatured it, the good fortune of Bra-

zilians is that they copied badly,' creat-

ing a particular way of speaking the"international language." Howeverpolemic it may be, Sales Gómez's

schematization is rich in meanings. IfBrazilian art, like the mistaken dove of

Rafael Alberti, desired to go north butwent south, in the end it is less aboutdisorientation than de-orientation. Such

a dynamic has allowed Brazilian artists

a highly original participation within an

"international" post-minimal, concep-tual tendency. They have charged it with

an expressivity that is almost existential,

shattering a prevailing, tedious coldness,

and have introduced sophistication into

the material itself and at the same time a

human proximity towards it. They havediversified, made more complex and yet

subverted the practice of this "interna-

tional language." The personality of this

anti-samba aesthetic is not producedas frequently occurs among Caribbeans

and Andinosthrough representationsor important activation of vernacularculture, but rather through a specificmanner of making contemporary art. lt

is an identity disinterested in "identity,"

an identity through action, not through

representation.

By virtue of the characteristics of an

early colonization that Europeanizedthis vast area, the culture of LatinAmerica, and especially that of the vi-

sual arts, has frequently played on therebound. That is to say, artists havereturned the balls that arrived from the

North, appropriating hegemonic ten-dencies and thus turning them intotheir own individual creativities with-

in the complexity of their context. Crit-

ical discourses have emphasized such

strategies of re-signification, transfor-

mation, and syncretism in order to con-

front the constant accusation of beingcopycats and derivatives that, notwithout reason, we have suffered from

(in fact, only the Japanese surpass us

in the art of copying). Postmodernity,with its discrediting of originality and

its validation of the copy has been ofgreat help to us. But equally plausible

would be the displacements of focusthat would recognize how Latin Amer-

ican art has enriched the framework of

the "international" from within. Forexample, José Clemente Orozco is al-ways analyzed within the context ofMexican muralism. It would be much

more productive to see him as one ofthe key figures of Expressionism, as he

is without doubt. Although WifredoLam is considered to have introduced

specific elements of African origin to

Surrealism, only recently has he beenrecognized for having used modern-ism as a space for the expression ofAfrican-Caribbean content, thus af-firming an anti-hegemonic position.

It is problematic that dominant cen-ters always get the kick-off. One cannot

continually move in the same North-South direction according to the domi-

nant power structure. No matter how

valid a different and opposing trans-cul-tural strategy might be within the dom-

inant structure, it implicates a perennial

condition of response that reproduces

this hegemony. This stands even if it con-

tests this structure and still manages to

take advantage of it much in the man-ner of the martial arts in which, without

the use of their arms, contenders avail

themselves of the strength of a more

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powerful opponent. It is equally neces-

sary to invert the direction of the cur-rent, not by reversing a binary schemeof transference but rather by contribut-

ing to pluralization in order to enrichand transform the existing situation. A

horizontal, South-South volley wouldalso be welcome, tending toward thedevelopment of a truly global network

of interactions on all sides. Cultural ex-changes within globalization still appear

to be laid out from the centers in a radial

schema, with insufficient connections. A

structure of axial globalization with its

zones of silence, designs economic, po-

litical, and cultural circuits that macro-

conform the entire planet. Globalization

has speeded up and pluralized culturalcirculation, but has done so following the

structure of the economy, reproducingin a certain measure its structures ofpower. Hence the difficulty of achieving

the modifications in the flows to which

I have referred, since the currents usual-

ly move according to where the money

is. Fortunately, the processes of interna-

tionalization that globalization has trig-

gered appear to lead us graduallytoward a more fluid cultural interaction.

We are living through a slippery mo-ment of transition, a post-utopian epoch

that seeks changes within existing struc-

tures rather than changing the structures

themselves.

When I stated that the best thing thatwas happening to Latin American artwas that it was ceasing to be LatinAmerican art, I was also referring tothe problematic totalization that theterm carries. Some writers prefer tospeak of "art in Latin America" instead

of "Latin American art," as a de-em-phasizing convention that tries to un-derline, on the very level of language,

its rejection of the suspicious construc-

tion of an integral, emblematic LatinAmerica, 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 symbolicproduction 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

generalizations that are still recognized

as depictions of a slippery Latin Amer-

ican cultural identity, or of some regions

in particular: magic realism, the mar-velous (both related to the surrealistproclamation about Latin Americamade by And ré Breton in Mexico), mes-

tizaje (miscegenation), the baroque, the

constructive impulse, revolutionary

discourse, etc. These categories, how-ever justified, served the efforts of "re-

sistance" against "imperialist" cultural

penetration. They had a notable rise in

the 1960s within a militant Latin Amer-

icanism that was characteristic of thehistorical period marked by the Cuban

Revolution and guerrilla movements.

However, those ideologies came toover-construct the categories with a to-

talizing effect, so that they became ste-

reotypes for the outside gaze. To speak

of magic realism or miscegenation asglobal etiquettes today sounds almost

like an El Zorro movie.

Latin America has participated in the

global development of what we couldschematize as a minimal and concep-tual "international, postmodern lan-guage." But to a considerable extent ithas done so in its own manner, and by

introducing differences. Many artistswork as much "toward the inside" as"toward the outside" of the art, usingpost-conceptual resources in order to

integrate the aesthetic, the social, thecultural, the historic, and the religious

without sacrificing specific artistic re-search. We might say that in realitythey are empowering artistic discourse

by taking it into new territories and

expanding its capacity for dense andrefined meaning. These artists arestrengthening the analytic and linguis-

tic tools of post conceptualism in or-der to struggle with the complexity of

society and culture in Latin America,where multiplicity, hybridization, andcontrasts have introduced contradic-tions as well as subtleties.

This plan contradicts a certain "mili-tant" tradition of Latin American art, in

favor of another very different tradition

of fluidity and complexity in the man-

ner in which the culture of the conti-nent has actively dealt with the social

problem. The former operates withgreater clarity on the plane of the signi-

fied than on that of its signifiers and is

in keeping with contemporary practic-

es in other peripheral areas. Moreover,

it has to do with a projection that ismore individual and derivative of theartist himself, than with any partisan-

ship or militant sense that places art in

a position subordinate to political and

social discourses that tend to endow artwith a merely illustrative function.

Doris Salcedo. Untitled, 2001. Wood, concrete,

glass, fabric and steel. 80 x 67 x 50 in.

(203,5 x 170 x 120 cm.). Courtesy:Alexander and

Bonin, New York and White Cube, London.

ARTNEXUS 73

'




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Waltercio Caldas. Yellow ( ), 2002. Stainless steel, vynil and enamel.

24 x 36 V, x 6 in. (60 x 93 x 15 cm.). Courtesy: Christopher Grimes Gallery.

This difference in terms of meaningis one of the changes enacted with re-

spect to the totalizing paradigms to

which I have referred; such paradigmsprocured a characteristically LatinAmerican language right from the start.

These new artists seem less interestedin showing their passport. Culturalcomponents act more within the con-text of discourse than visually, even incases in which these were based upon

the vernacular. This does not mean that

there is no Latin American look in thework of numerous artists, or even that

one cannot point to certain identifyingtraits of some countries or areas. What

is crucial is the fact that these identitiesbegin to manifest themselves more by

their features as an artistic practice than

by their use of identifying elements tak-

en from folklore, religion, the physical

environment, or history This develop-ment implies the presence of the con-text and of culture understood in itsbroadest meaning, and internalized inthe very manner of constructing works

or discourses. But it also implies praxis

of art itself, insofar as art establishesidentifiable constants by delineatingcultural typologies in the very processof making art, rather than merely ac-centuating cultural factors interjectedinto it. Thus, much Brazilian art is iden-

tifiable more by the manner in which it

refers to ways of making art than justprojecting contexts.

To emphasize the practice of art as the

creator of cultural difference confronts

the orientation of modernist discours-

74 ARTNEXUS

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Glenda Orta. Choosing Simultaneity, 2002. Televisions placed on

building windows.

es in Latin America. These tended toaccentuate a contrary direction, that isto say, the manner in which art corre-

sponded to an already given nationalculture. Artists worked, to a certain ex-

tent, to legitimize themselves within the

framework of a prevailing nationalism

to which they contributed. Beyond this

confrontation, context is a basic factorin the works of the artists who have es-

tablished a new perspective that, morethan representing contexts, constructs

worksfrom them. Physical and cultural

identities and social environments are

performed more than being merely rep-resented. They are in fact identities and

contexts concurrent in the "internation-al" meta-language of the arts and in the

discussion of contemporary globalthemes.

In a departure from the previous dis-

cussion, one could outline a historicalperspective that runs perhaps from"provincial European art" to "deriva-tive art" to "Latin American art" to "art

in Latin America" to "art from LatinAmerica." I do not refer to the charac-ter of this production in different his-torical moments, but to the prevalentepistemologies. The last of these terms

emphasizes the active participation of

art in "international" circuits and lan-guages.'° It refers to an interventionthat brings with it anti-homogenizingdifferences and its legitimization with-

in the "international"" arena. That isto say, it identifies the construction of

the global from the position of differ-ence, underlining the appearance of

new cultural subjects in an internation-

al arena that until recently was underlock and chain. We cannot say that this

arena is now open, but that it doeshave more doors, and that these canbe opened with different kinds of keys.

*Translated from Spanish by MicheleFaguet.

NOTES

1. Gerardo Mosquera, "El arte latinoamericano deja de

serlo," ARCO Latino, Madrid, 1996, pp 7-10.

2. Frederico Morais, Las Artes Plásticas en la América

Latina: del Trance a lo Transitorio, Casa de las Ameri-

cas, Havana, 119791 1990, pp 4-5.

3. Olu Oguibe, "In the Heart of Darkness," Third Text,

no. 23, Summer 1993, pp 3-8.4. V.Y.Mudimbe, The Invention of Africa, (Indiana

University Press, Bloomington and Indianapolis), 1988.

5. Mánica Amor, "Cartographies: Exploring the

Limitations of a Curatorial Paradigm," Beyond the

Fantastic. Contemporary Art Criticism from Latin America,

ed. Gerardo Mosquera, (Institute of International Visual

Arts, London/MIT Press, Cambridge), 1995.

6. Jean Fisher, "Editorial: Some Thoughts on 'Contamina-

tions,'" Third Text London, no. 32,Autumn 1995, pp 3-7.

7. Boris Bernstein, "Algunas consideraciones en rela-

ción con el problema 'arte y etnos," Criterios, Havana,

nos. 5-12, January 1983-December 1984, p 267.

8. Gerardo Mosquera, "tLenguaje internacional?" La-

piz, Madrid, no. 121, April 1996, pp 12-15.

9. Ana Maria de Moraes Belluzzo in conversation with

the author.

10. Thus the subtitle of my anthology from 1995.

11. The insistence of quotation marks stresses the

reductive meaning within which it is still appropriate

to use this term.

GERARDO MOSQUERA

Cuban Art Historian, Curator and Critic. He

currently works as curator for the New

Museum of Contemporary Art, New York.

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