Description
Book SynopsisThe 1960s were heady years in Argentina. The isolation of the Peron era was over, the economy was doing well, and the arts were newly invigorated. This book presents an examination of the 1960s as a brief historical moment when artists, institutions, and critics organized to promote an international identity for Argentina's visual arts.
Trade Review“Giunta carefully defines the polemics in transforming Buenos Aires into an internationally recognized center for artistic production and avant-garde culture. . . . Recommended.” -- L. E. Carranza * Choice *
“Giunta carefully defines the polemics in transforming Buenos Aires into an internationally recognized center for artistic production and avant-garde culture. . . . Recommended.” -
L. E. Carranza,
Choice“Giunta has done an admirable job of organizing information from myriad sources. Her close focus on the art world reflects the paradox of Argentine identity: are Argentinians Europeans stranded in the New World or creators of a new nation? They can’t decide, and neither can the country’s artists.” - Alfred Mac Adam,
ArtNews“Giunta has done an admirable job of organizing information from myriad sources. Her close focus on the art world reflects the paradox of Argentine identity: are Argentinians Europeans stranded in the New World or creators of a new nation? They can’t decide, and neither can the country’s artists.” -- Alfred Mac Adam * ARTnews *
“Well written and thoroughly documented, this book is an invaluable tool for those interested in the evolution of contemporary art in Latin America (engulfed as it was in the love triangle Buenos Aires-Paris-New York). The choice of artists and images is superb. . . .
Avant-Garde, Internationalism, and Politics is not just a book about history, it offers a fascinating explanation of the current state of Argentine and Latin American art in the era of globalization.” -
Georgina Jiménez,
Latin American Review of Books“Meticulously researched and engagingly written. . . .” -- Robin Adèle Greeley * Oxford Art Journal *
“Meticulously researched and engagingly written. . . .” - Robin Adèle Greeley,
Oxford Art Journal“Well written and thoroughly documented, this book is an invaluable tool for those interested in the evolution of contemporary art in Latin America (engulfed as it was in the love triangle Buenos Aires-Paris-New York). The choice of artists and images is superb. . . .
Avant-Garde, Internationalism, and Politics is not just a book about history, it offers a fascinating explanation of the current state of Argentine and Latin American art in the era of globalization.” -- Georgina Jiménez * Latin American Review of Books *
“
Avant-Garde, Internationalism, and Politics is a precise and intelligent book. It is also profoundly original in its reconstruction of the public debate of the 1960s. Andrea Guinta has investigated the links between the artists and the revolutionary horizon, as well as those between the artists and establishment institutions. With this dual perspective, she follows in a fascinating way the processes of the internationalization of Latin American art. Her book is indispensable to understanding the political and aesthetic ideologies of the period.”—
Beatriz Sarlo, author of
Jorge Luis Borges: A Writer on the Edge“Andrea Giunta is one of the sharpest minds working in the post–World War II cultural field anywhere, and
Avant-Garde, Internationalism, and Politics is a work of amazing breadth, originality, and complexity. It touches on many facets of U.S. cultural life as well as on the many ways a Latin American country tried to find a suitable postwar identity in a ruthless historical moment. With this book, Giunta is redefining the parameters not only of art history in Argentina but of contemporary cultural discourses in general.”—
Serge Guilbaut, author of
How New York Stole the Idea of Modern Art: Abstract Expressionism, Freedom, and the Cold War“How can artists and institutions from peripheral countries participate in global conversations?Mexican muralists, Brazilian avant-gardists, and the São Paulo Biennale have done it. Yet none have done so with as sophisticated a strategy as those who remade the visual and multimedia arts scene in 1960s Buenos Aires. Offering the most thoroughly documented and innovative analysis of that period, Andrea Giunta eloquently renews Latin American art criticism.”—
Néstor García Canclini“Duke University Press has performed an important service to the readers of Latin American art history and to historians in general by publishing a translation.” -- Donna J. Guy * American Historical Review *
Table of ContentsList of Illustrations ix
About the Series xi
Preface and Acknowledgments xiii
Translator’s Note xvii
Abbreviations xix
Introduction 1
1. Modern Art on the Margins of Peronism 25
2. Proclamations and Programs During the Revolucion Libertadora 55
3. The “New” Art Scene 91
4. The Avant-Garde as Problem 119
5. The Decentering of the Modernist Paradigm 163
6. Strategies of Internationalization 189
7. The Avant-Garde Between Art and Politics 243
Conclusions 281
Notes 291
Bibliography 373
Index 397
