Tesis para optar al grado de Magíster en Estudios Latinoamericanos

Seguindo a proposta metodológica comparativa do PROLAM Programa de Pós-Graduação em Integração na América Latina da Universidade de São Paulo o presente estudo analisa a produção crítica de dois expoentes do cenário cultural latino-americano do século XX: Antonio Bento e Romero Brest. Esses autores são contemporâneos entre si e amealharam importantes contribuições para a crítica de arte de seus respectivos países, Brasil e Argentina, na consolidação do abstracionismo. Através de uma abordagem comparativa sobre ambos os críticos, destacaram-se as aproximações e diferenças nos seus discursos. Constituíram objetivos dessa pesquisa, promover um levantamento das principais questões artísticas debatidas em ambos os países, Brasil e Argentina, no arco temporal abordado (1947-61) e investigar a atuação da iniciativa privada e do Estado no contexto de construção de Projetos Culturais. Por fim, buscou-se evidenciar as contribuições de uma crítica de arte especializada na construção de uma arte abstrata como fluxo universal. / In accordance with the proposal of comparative methodology established by PROLAM Graduate Studies Program in Latin America Integration of the University of São Paulo this study analyzes the critical production of two renowned names in Latin Americas 20th century scene: Antonio Bento and Romero Brest. These authors were contemporaneous and amassed important contributions to the art critique in their respective countries, Brazil and Argentina, in the consolidation of abstractionism. Through a comparative approach to both critics, we highlight the similarities and differences in their discourses. This research aims at surveying the main artistic issues debated in both countries, Brazil and Argentina, within the time frame approached (1947-1961), and investigating the performance of private and governmental initiatives in the context of building Cultural Projects. Ultimately, we sought to evince the contributions of an art critique specialized in building abstract art as a universal flow.

Desde su origen, la crítica y la historia del arte argentinas siguen los modelos europeos. Las herramientas de análisis e interpretación, los criterios de evaluación de las obras y los modos de periodizar y de organizar el relato histórico, respetan las normas establecidas especialmente por la historiografía del arte moderno francés. Los autores argentinos consideran que el arte local integra el espacio mundial del arte occidental, pero comprenden que éste se ubica en una región marginal y que responde a una temporalidad que no concuerda con la cadencia del desarrollo del arte moderno de las regiones centrales. El arte argentino es así habitualmente juzgado como un arte provinciano y retrasado, que no logra ajustarse a las pautas impuestas por el canon francés. Esta percepción se nutre del contacto de los argentinos con la cultura francesa a través de sus viajes, de las visitas de los autores extranjeros y de la literatura especializada francófona disponible en Argentina. Con algunas excepciones, esa percepción domina la escritura sobre arte hasta la década del sesenta. A partir de ese momento, el modelo francés es progresivamente puesto en crisis, combinado con otras perspectivas y abandonado. Estas transformaciones ocurren en el marco general de las revisiones disciplinares del pasaje entre la era moderna y la contemporaneidad. Ellas no se producen de manera uniforme o monolítica sino que son el resultado de revisiones graduales de la función, la metodología y el estilo de la escritura sobre arte. La crisis que afecta a los modelos de autoridad tradicionales lleva a los autores a buscar nuevos fundamentos en diversas áreas del conocimiento, como la psicología, la sociología o en los sistemas teóricos que proponen el estructuralismo y la semiótica. Los discursos latinoamericanistas, reactivados durante los años sesenta, contribuyen a esa revisión y otorgan elementos conceptuales para el desarrollo de nuevas perspectivas en la crítica y el estudio del arte. / Esta tesis fue realizada bajo el régimen de cotutela a partir de un convenio firmado entre la Facultad de Bellas Artes de la UNLP y la Université Rennes 2-UEB de Francia.

In the 1950s and 1960s, the Organization of American States (OAS), a multinational political organization headquartered in Washington, DC, attempted to mediate U.S.-Latin American political and cultural relations. This dissertation traces how, in the United States, Latin American art emerged as a field of art historical study and exhibition via the activities of the OAS. I center my analysis on José Gómez Sicre and Rafael Squirru, two prominent curators who influenced the circulation of Latin American art during the Cold War. Part I focuses on Gómez Sicre, who served as head curator at the OAS from 1946 to 1981 and who founded the Museum of Modern Art of Latin America in 1976. I offer an analysis of Gómez Sicre’s aesthetic tastes, contextualizing them in relation to his contemporaries Alfred H. Barr, Jr., Marta Traba, and Jorge Romero Brest. I also discuss his efforts to build a network of art centers across the Americas, indicating how his activities fed into a Cold War struggle around notions of the “intellectual.” Part II examines the activities of poet and art critic Rafael Squirru, who served as Director of Cultural Affairs of the OAS from 1963 to 1970 and who theorized Latin American art in terms of the “new man.” I reconstruct how the phrase “new man” became a point of ideological conflict in the 1960s in a battle between Squirru and his political rival, Ernesto Ché Guevara. Throughout this dissertation, I indicate how Gómez Sicre and Squirru framed modern art within different Pan-American dreams of future world prosperity, equality, and cooperation. By examining the socio-political implications behind those dreams, I reveal the structures and limits of power shaping their influence during the Cold War. My study concentrates on the period from the founding of the OAS in 1948 to the establishment of the Museum of Modern Art of Latin America in 1976, and I contend that the legacies of Pan-Americanism continue to affect the field of Latin American art today. / text