The Other Boom in Latin America: The Expansion of Art from the Region in New York

May 7, 202300:10

“Living in New York is different”says the young woman in Spanish, while talking on the phone and walking hastily down the sidewalk in Manhattan. Right at the border where they cross Chinatown And Little Italy, a true symbol of the diversity of cultures that coexist on this island: restaurants serve typical Italian pasta in front of shops with an abundance of products imported from Asia. We won’t know why living here is different for her, as she heads toward the Buddhist temple on Canal Street. Although it is clear that wherever they come from, they all seem to feel right at home.

sunny sun in Center Park It is possible to meet a newly married couple with oriental features posing for a photographer, a few meters from the bridge where the bride in white receives instructions in language that sounds like Russian: with black glasses and a big smile, she stands still. So the camera can record her with her new husband. Two other women covered in niqabs talk while looking at their cellphones, and one blonde woman asks her partner in Spanish which of the tree-lined paths they will continue on.

That should come as no surprise in this context Several major New York institutions host exhibitions by Latin American artists these days. But yeah, it’s a milestone: the visual arts seem to be to blame Another regional boomsimilar to those raised more than half a century ago by such writers as Gabriel García Márquez, Mario Vargas Llosa, Carlos Fuentes and Julio Cortázar.

“It is a dream come true,” the Spanish curator admits Gabriel Perez Barreroconsultant for Colección Patricia Phelps de Cisneros, who directed it for more than a decade until 2019. Standing next to a painting from Uruguay Joaquin Torres Garcia Donated to the museum by a Venezuelan collector, it is among more than 250 created by artists from the region. It’s now on display in a room at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, along with what this expert defines as his “last masterpiece.” Piet Mondrian. according to him, Broadway Boogie Woogie (1942-43) also came to incorporate one of the most important collections on the planet thanks to the generous administration of another Latin American: the multifaceted Brazilian artist Maria Martins, muse of Marcel Duchamp.

“Latin American artworks are incorporated into the museum’s collection on a daily basis; It is something no one would have thought of fifteen or twenty years ago“, explains Perez-Barrero enthusiastically. He adds that the two aforementioned coexist in turn with a sculpture by Yente, pioneer of abstraction in Argentina, purchased in 2020 by MoMA thanks to a fund also promoted by Phelps de Cisneros. “It was a major decision not to make a museum our own – says the coordinator – and to work instead with other institutions; This makes it possible to reach a larger audience, to create a dialogue with artists from all over the world, and to put resources at the service of knowledge, through scholarship programs.”

In MoMA, one of the most visited museums on the planet, an exhibition of contemporary art in Latin America was also inaugurated a few days ago, consisting mainly of the pieces donated by me: Selected memories is a continuation the modern south – opened in 2019 and focused on abstract art – both by Argentinians Agnes Katzenstein. “This allows us to show works by many artists that are not normally seen in New York, in a way that is transgenerational and geographically modifiable,” says Curator of Latin American Art at MoMA, where she also directs the Cisneros Institute for Latin American Art Research.

“Sometimes I think ‘mission accomplished’ in the sense that any museum, biennale, exhibition or cultural event today should consider Latin America a cultural region Phelps de Cisneros told LA NACION. This was not always the case, and achieving this change was made possible by the efforts of many people. Currently in New York there are such great galleries as Gego at the Guggenheim, Bispo de Rosario at the Americas Society, Daniel Lind-Ramos at MoMA PS 1, and any number of other projects. This is becoming commonplace, and the MoMA has been a major player in this change.”

fifteen of Two hundred works by Gego that Guggenheim included measure infinity. “This is his first show at a New York museum,” Jeanine Gutierrez Guimarães, the Peruvian-American curator responsible for this exhibition with Mexican Pablo Leon de la Parra, proudly remarks. And immediately remember the story of Gertrude Goldschmidt, An immigrant who arrived in Venezuela fleeing the Nazis without knowing the local culture or language. She brought with her an engineering degree, which served as the basis for building complex and precise abstract structures with wire, aluminum and steel.

A smaller version of this exhibition will open at the Guggenheim in Bilbao in November. In the same month, three blocks away from the headquarters in New York, The Jewish Museum will open an anthology by Marta Minogen. “I’ve never exhibited alone in a museum in New York, it’s the best!” The artist who had come to perform in that city with Andy Warhol had been partying enthusiastically for months; In 1985 he simulated the payment of Argentine foreign debt with corn, “Latin American gold”. Meanwhile, his work Synchronization in Simultaneity (1966) through July at MoMA for group exhibition Streamers: How Video Transformed the World.

Midway between the two institutions is the Society of the Americas, a major space in the promotion of Latin American art in the United States. Directed by Argentina Amy Iglesias LookinUntil the 20th of this month, he presents the first solo exhibition in the United States by an Afro-Brazilian artist Bishop of Rosario. Many of the more than a thousand pieces he made while confined to a psychiatric institution in Rio de Janeiro, where he lived most of his life, are on display there.

Puerto Rico’s facilities are also fueled by African roots Daniel Lind RamosOffered until September MOMA PS1. MoMA’s experimental space is so named because it housed Queens’ first public school, when it was a working-class immigrant area. “In this yard we have parties with DJs for 1,500 people, they were called Heating. I’d say we’re great,” he adds with humour.

Just as the specimen he dedicated was great Thomas Saracino Last year the cultural center shed, located next to the luxurious Hudson Yards real estate complex and the High Line. Also those organized by the Argentine exhibitions Barro and Praxis y Silencio, current exhibition of photographs by Ido Costantini In Chinatown Soup, a space dedicated to emerging artists. “At the opening came Jessie Paris Smith, daughter of Patti. Determined to follow his own path, he settled in New York and founded Kolapse, a platform that brings artists, musicians and filmmakers together,” says Danny Bennett, producer of his father Tony, and Jonathan Baker, son of Malba’s founder.Reinvent our worldNothing less.