“Les Sud-américains de Paris. Latin American Artists and Cultural Resistance in Robho Magazine”

ISABEL PLANTE

Third Text

ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD

Lugar: Londres; Año: 2010 vol. 24 p. 445 - 455

0952-8822

Edited in Paris between 1967 and 1971 by the art critic Jean Clay and the visual poet Julien Blaine, Robho magazine introduced an international scope of art issues. The magazine project aimed at shedding light on institutional critique and cultural resistance activities against American-style capitalist expansion. In this approach, Robho included a significant number of Latin American artists. With graphic design by Carlos Cruz-Diez, many of the magazine’s central articles were devoted to Madi art, Jesús Rafael Soto, Julio Le Parc, Lygia Clark and the Argentine collective experience Tucumán Burns. Even if the aforementioned artists were neither political exiles nor guerrilla fighters it may be thought that cultural belonging to Latin America carried particular connotations within the context of crisis of French modernization in the 1960s, related with the imaginary of the Third World. This article aims at analyzing Robho magazine’s selection and interpretation of the work of Latin American artists during this period dominated by the events of May ’68 and the mistrust toward representativity.