Posts from the “Latin America” Category

Patti Smith: Wing

Posted on January 15, 2019

Patti Smith (1946) Patti at William Burroughs Grave, Lawrence, Kansas, May 2013 Silver gelatin print Photo by Lenny Kaye. Image courtesy of the artist and kurimanzutto, Mexico City / New York.

In the early 1970s, Patti Smith travelled to Mexico with a Polaroid camera in hand, making photographs as components for collages, most of which have been lost to history. In the decades since, Smith returned time and again, creating a series of images and poems inspired by a feeling of kinship with the nation and its flourishing artistic community.

Now, a selection of 30 photographs is on view in Patti Smith: Wing, a celebration of creation and communion. Wing is also the title of a poem about freedom, both physical and spiritual, as well as the act of travelling independently to distant lands.

“I am not a photographer, yet taking pictures has given me a sense of unity and personal satisfaction,” Smith writes in Land 250. “They are relics of my life. Souvenirs of my wandering. All that I have learned concerning light and composition is contained within them.”

Read the Full Story at Huck Online

Patti Smith (1946) Frida Kahlo’s corset 2, Casa Azul, Coyoacan, 2012 Gelatin silver print. Image courtesy of the artist and kurimanzutto, Mexico City.

Categories: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, Art, Books, Exhibitions, Huck, Latin America, Photography

Diana Markosian: Quince – Coming of Age in Cuba

Posted on October 23, 2018

Diana Markosian Girls stand outside their friend’s quinceañera venue as they wait for their big entrance © Diana Markosian | Magnum Photos

Diana Markosian Teens gather in the courtyard of a church as they prepare for their friend’s quinceañera festivities © Diana Markosian | Magnum Photos

After being awarded the 2018 Elliot Erwitt Fellowship Grant to travel to Cuba for one month, Diana Markosian set forth to explore the exquisite moment of transformation, as a girl becomes a woman in society, and the way this experience informs the feminine identity. The ensuing project, Quince, which is made up of portraits and imagery from locally made magazines, will be shown at Paris Photo, in the Grand Palais, from November 8-11.

“A lot of my work is about the past and memory. It is less about going somewhere and more about finding my way into that country and my understanding of what that country represents for me,” the Armenian-American artist explains.

Born in Moscow in 1989, Markosian’s early years were shaped by living through the total collapse of the Soviet Union. She discovered an immediate and intimate parallel between her childhood experiences and the lives of those she encountered during her visit, “The 90s in Cuba was a time that is referred to as the ‘special period’ — a moment when the country, which was dependent on the Soviet Union, was in total economic collapse. It’s something I experienced first hand living in Moscow and Yerevan as a child.”

In sharing these stories, Markosian felt a connection to the lives of those she met in Cuba, and realized the story she was searching for could be found deeper in the countryside. She began traveling outside of Havana, going from town to town, until she arrived in Matanzas, famed as the birthplace of the Afro-Cuban music and dance traditions of danzón and rumba.

Here, she met a few girls and their parents, who struck up a conversation by showing Markosian a photobook that was made for their daughter’s quinceañera, a Latin American tradition celebrating a girl’s 15th birthday. As Markosian leafed through the book, she became intrigued.

Read the Full Story at Magnum Photos

Diana Markosian A girl rides around her neighbourhood in a pink 1950s convertible as her community gathers to celebrate her 15th birthday © Diana Markosian | Magnum Photos

Categories: Art, Latin America, Magnum Photos, Photography, Women

David Bailey: Peru

Posted on October 21, 2018

Photo: © David Bailey

David Bailey is at home anywhere he goes. Driven by a profound sense of curiosity and a desire to engage, the photographer’s observant eye and quick intellect allow him entrée into just about any situation he chooses for himself; his calm confidence combined with an easy laugh span any chasm where language might otherwise be a barrier.

“They probably think I am mad for wanting to take a picture of them,” Bailey tells AnOther, reflecting on his experiences travelling through Peru in 1971 and 1984, with Grace Coddington for British Vogue and the Wool Board, and for Tatler, respectively.

Bailey made a practice of shooting fashion in the morning and evening so that he had the day to himself. He made his way through the cities and the towns, travelling across the plains and into the mountains, to create a captivating portrait of a people and a place collected in the new exhibition David Bailey: Peru, opening October 19 at Heni Gallery, London, and accompanying book publishing November 1.

Bailey’s Peru unfolds like an epic poem filled with magic and mystery, history and myth, as scenes of daily life evoke a sense of timeless wonder and awe. Now in his 80th year, Bailey laughs, “You ask me to remember what, 60 years ago?” – only to do just that for us.

Read the Full Story at AnOther Online

Photo: © David Bailey

Categories: 1970s, 1980s, AnOther, Art, Books, Fashion, Latin America, Photography

Che Guevara: Tú Y Todos

Posted on October 3, 2018

ore than 50 years after his death, Ernesto Che Guevara has become an icon for the fight against Western hegemony around the globe. His decision to continue fighting abroad following the success of the Cuban Revolution sealed his fate. His capture and execution in Bolivia in 1967 at the age of 39 has made him one of the most revolutionary figures of our time.

In celebration of a singular life, Che Guevara: Tú y Todos (Skira) delves deep into the insurgent’s personal life in order to craft a more intimate, nuanced portrait of the man whose face launched a thousand t-shirts.

The book takes its subtitle from the title of a poem Guevara penned for his wife Aleida before leaving Argentina for Bolivia, where he would ultimately die. This intimacy provides the framework in which book editors Daniele Zambelli, Flavio Andreini, Camilo Guevara March, María del Carmen Ariet have framed Guevara’s epic story.

Read the Full Story at Huck Online

Categories: 1960s, Art, Books, Huck, Latin America, Photography

Alex Webb & Rebecca Norris Webb: Violet Isle

Posted on August 31, 2018

For more than a century, Cuba has mesmerized the world, beckoning visitors to its vibrant shores and the rich fertile soil that has earned the island the little-known name of the “Violet Isle.” It is a land of captivating beauty, majestic wonder, and alluring mystique, one whose magic and mysteries are slowly revealed through the work of artists, filmmakers, and musicians.

Over a period of 15 years, American photographers Alex Webb and Rebecca Norris Webb made 11 trips to Cuba, each drawn to difference elements of this multi-faceted gem. Alex Webb explored the country’s street life, capturing scenes of everyday life set in a prism of vivid colors that glow under the Caribbean sun, while Rebecca Norris Webb was drawn to the resounding presence of animal life, photographing tiny zoos, pigeon societies, and personal menageries.

The result is Violet Isle (Radius Books), their first collaboration. First published in 2009, the book is a photographic duet that pairs two distinct but complementary visions of Cuba at the turn of the millennium. The book, long unavailable, has just been re-released. We speak with the authors here about their fresh take on a much-photographed land, giving us new perspectives of life on the Violet Isle.

Read the Full Story at Feature Shoot

Categories: 1990s, Art, Books, Feature Shoot, Latin America, Photography

Andrea Giunta: Radical Women – Latin American Art, 1960-1985

Posted on July 22, 2018

Paz Errazuriz (Chilean, b. 1944), La Palmera (The palm tree), 1987, from the series La manzana de Adan (Adam’s Apple), 1982-90. Gelatin silver print. 15 9/16 × 23 ½ in. (39.5 × 59.7 cm). Courtesy of the artist and Galeria AFA, Santiago. ©the artist.

Radical Women: Latin American Art, 1960-1985, the phenomenal survey of Latin American artists, enters its final weekend at the Brooklyn Museum, where it will be on view through July 22, 2018. Accompanied by a catalogue of the same name published by DelMonico|Prestel, the exhibition is a stunning tour de force through a quarter century across the Western hemisphere showcasing an extraordinary group of women who experimented with photography, performance, video, and conceptual art to explore the issues of autonomy, oppression, violence, and the environment.

Photography plays a pivotal role in Radical Women, examining how it is both a work of art and a piece of evidence. Here archetypes and iconography are pushed to the edge as the artists featured here subvert expectations and stereotypes, offering fresh and empowering new perspectives for consideration.

Guest curator Andrea Giunta, who co-curated the exhibition with Cecilia Fajardo-Hill, shares insights into the ways artists used photography to raise awareness, expose, and explore the issues facing Latin American women during a tumultuous and transformative time in history – issues that are as pertinent then as they are today.

Read the Full Story at Feature Shoot

Maria Evelia Marmolejo (Colombian, b. 1958), 11 de marzo—ritual a la menstruacion, digno de toda mujer como antecedente del origen de la vida (March 11—ritual in honor of menstruation, worthy of every woman as a precursor to the origin of life), 1981. Photography: Camilo Gomez. Nine black-and-white photographs. Five sheets: 11 3/4 × 8 1/4 in. (29.8 × 21 cm) each; four sheets: 8 1/4 × 11 3/4 in. (21 × 29.8 cm) each. Courtesy of Maria E. Marmolejo and Prometeo Gallery di Ida Pisani, Milan. ©the artist.

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, Art, Books, Exhibitions, Feature Shoot, Latin America, Photography, Women

Ricky Flores: The Puerto Rican Day Parade

Posted on June 10, 2018

After Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico, the official death count was reported as 64 people. But last week, The New England Journal of Medicine published a study with a conservative estimate of 4,645 dead in what was the second most devastating tropical cyclone in U.S. history since 1900.

The new report underscores the government’s failure to help its citizens when they needed it most. The response to Maria dishearteningly echoes a past disaster—how Nixon’s White House policies of “benign neglect” leveled the streets of Puerto Rican neighborhoods in New York City, reducing them to rubble and dirt.

At that time, photographer Ricky Flores lived in the Longwood section of the South Bronx, an area infamously known as “Fort Apache” after the 1981 film of that name. A first generation Puerto Rican-American, Flores came of age as his once-thriving community was being systematically decimated by the government, and as Puerto Ricans began organizing to fight for what was rightfully theirs.

Puerto Rican pride is an integral part of New York’s diverse populace. Every year on the second Sunday in June, the community comes together on Fifth Avenue to celebrate with the Puerto Rican Day Parade. In advance of the 60th annual parade on June 10, Flores spoke with VICE about how Puerto Ricans have the power to change the course of history.

Read the Full Story at VICE Online

Categories: 1980s, Art, Bronx, Latin America, Manhattan, Photography, Vice

Radical Women: Latin American Art, 1960-1985

Posted on September 28, 2017

Photo: Sandra Eleta (Panamanian, b. 1942), Edita (la del plumero), Panamá (Edita (the one with the duster), Panama), 1978-1979. Black and white photograph. 30 × 30 in. (76.2 × 76.2 cm)Courtesy of the artist. Artwork © the artist

“I don’t give a shit what the world thinks. I was born a bitch, I was born a painter, I was born fucked. But I was happy in my way. You did not understand what I am. I am love. I am pleasure, I am essence, I am an idiot, I am an alcoholic, I am tenacious. I am; simply I am,” Frida Kahlo wrote in a letter to her husband, artist Diego Rivera.

The Mexican artist, who faithfully painted self-portraits throughout the course of her life, has become not only one the most famous artists in the world, but is very often the only Latin American women artist most people know by name. The invisibility of her comrades can be attributed to the power structures within the art world that disregarded the major contributions that women from 20 countries have been making to the art world throughout the twentieth century.

Radical Women: Latin American Art, 1960-1985, a new exhibition on view at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, is a major step towards setting the record straight with more than 260 works by 116 women artists now on view through December 31, 2017. Curated by Dr. Cecilia Fajardo-Hill and Dr. Andrea Giunta, Radical Women is a watershed moment in the art world, illustrating the power of intersectionality in the new millennium.

Six years in the making, Radical Women brings together women from across Central and South America, the Caribbean, and the United States, showcasing the works of pioneers making art on their own terms, including Brazilian art star Lygia Pape, who had a solo exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art earlier this year; visionary Venezuelan Pop artist Marisol, who died at the age of 83 in 2016; and the gender-bending self-portraiture of Cuban American performance artist Ana Mendieta, whose husband was found not guilty of her murder in 1985.

The exhibition, which is accompanied by a catalogue of the same name, published by Prestel, is a brilliant introduction to both the artists and the issues they face as women in the Latin American diaspora, providing their own take on feminism, patriarchy, gender, sexuality, identity, and art history. We spotlight six artists you should know, who have inherited the mantle from the indomitable Frida Kahlo.

Read the Full Story at Dazed

Photo: “Marcha gay (Gay pride march)”, 1984. Gelatin silver print. 11 × 14 in. (27.9 × 35.6 cm) Courtesy of Yolanda Andrade.

Photo: Paz Errázuriz (Chilean, b. 1944), La Palmera, from the series La manzana de Adán (Adam’s Apple), 1987. Digital archival pigment print on Canson platinum paper. 19 5/8 × 23 1/2 in. (49.8 × 59.7 cm)Courtesy of the artist and Galeria AFA, Santiago. Artwork © the artist.

Categories: 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, Art, Books, Dazed, Exhibitions, Latin America, Photography, Women

Manuel Alvarez Bravo

Posted on February 4, 2017

Photo: Manuel Alvarez Bravo, The Daughter of the Dancers (La hija de los danzantes). 1933. Gelatin-silver print. 9 1/4 x 6 11/16″. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Purchase.

I can still remember the first art show I ever reviewed. It was the Manuel Alvarez Bravo retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art, which was 20 years ago this month. I was on assignment for The Village Voice, writing for this brand new thing folks were calling “The World Wide Web.”

I stepped into my first press preview and had a croissant, picked up a folder I still have (and I keep nothing) with an image a woman looking through a porthole in the wall. I was mystified, intrigued, and absolutely enthralled. I can still remember the first line of the review: “A man lies dead in the dirt, his hair slicked with blood like it was gel.” I knew then this was all I ever wanted—needed—to do. Be still and listen for the words that weave the spell.

It’s been a rather round about road, such is life, and on this, the 115th birthday of Alvarez Bravo, I give thanks. It all began with a photograph and the urge to give voice to the thousands of words that speak every language at the same time deep within the silent realm of a picture hanging on the wall.

Categories: Art, Exhibitions, Latin America, Photography

Mexique: 1910-1950 Renaissances

Posted on January 14, 2017

Artwork: Frida Kahlo (1907-1954) Le Cadre, 1938 Fixé sur verre (plaque de verre), Paris, Centre Pompidou, musée national d’art moderne, Centre de création industrielle Achat de l’État en 1939 © Centre Pompidou, MNAM-CCI, Dist. RMN-Grand Palais / Jean-Claude Planchet © [2016] Banco de México Diego Rivera Frida Kahlo Museums Trust, Mexico, D.F. / Adagp, Paris

“Pain, pleasure and death are no more than a process for existence. The revolutionary struggle in this process is a doorway open to intelligence,” Mexican artist Frida Kahlo observed, giving voice to the deeper meaning of our purpose on earth. While we are here, we experience things that delve deep below the surface of all that is polite, pleasant, and respectable, cutting to the very marrow of our bones and exposing us to the highest highs and the lowest lows. There is no escape from this—nor should there be. This is the path through which we learn that which is universal to life itself, and thus we begin to learn empathy.

Art is a vehicle to express, expose, and communicate in a language all its own that speaks to everyone in the sighted world without uttering a single word. Through the use of color, line, shape, and form, works of art convey ideas, experiences, and feelings, though we may not fully register all the layers at first glance. The brilliance of art is that it never changes, but we do, allowing us to learn more and more about our selves and the world in which we live.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Tina Modotti (1896-1942). Guitare, cartouchière et faucille, illustration de l’annonce pour la chanteuse communiste concha lichel, publiée dans el machete, no 168, Épreuve gélatino-argentique. Mexico, Museo Nacional de Arte, INBA Donation de la famille Maples Arce, 2015 1er juin 1929 © Francisco Kochen

Categories: Art, Crave, Exhibitions, Latin America

Eddie Palmieri: Harlem River Drive

Posted on December 15, 2016

Eddie Palmieri poses for a portrait during the filming of RBMA Presents The Note: Eddie Palmieri, at Red Bull Studios in New York, NY, USA on 22 March, 2016.

“Genius has a way of validating itself with time” observes Felipe Luciano as he reflects on Harlem River Drive, the seminal 1971 Latin-jazz-funk album by Eddie Palmieri in an episode of The Note, a new docuseries now available at Red Bull TV. You can watch the full episode at the end of the article, as well.

Palmieri, who celebrates his 80th birthday today, is one of the greatest American musicians of our time. Hailing from the South Bronx by way of Spanish Harlem, Palmieri is a first-generation Nuyorican who made his way, along with his brother Charlie, through the New York City public schools where he was exposed to jazz music. He first played Carnegie Hall at the age of 11, which portended well for the boy who would go on to become a pianist, bandleader, musicians, and composer who helped to shape the sound and style of Latin and jazz music over the course of seven decades.

Read the Full Story at Crave Online

Categories: 1970s, Bronx, Crave, Latin America, Manhattan, Music