La escritura sobre arte y las nuevas prácticas artísticas en Argentina a mediados de los años sesenta. El problema de la nacionalidad del arte

BERENICE GUSTAVINO; PAULA BARREIRO LÓPEZ; JULIÁN DÍAZ SÁNCHEZ; MIGUEL CABAÑAS BRAVO; JEAN-MARC POINSOT; MARÍA FLORENCIA SUÁREZ GUERRINI; SERGIO MOYINEDO; STÉPHAN HUCHET; BRIGITTE AUBRY

Críticas(s) de arte: discrepancias e hibridaciones de la Guerra Fria a la globalizacion

CENDEAC

Lugar: Murcia; Año: 2013; p. 97 - 113

Happenings, pop art and new artistic practices. Debates inart criticism in Argentina in the mid-sixties Berenice Gustavino Between 1965 and 1969 a series of reflections upon the new trends in art were produced by Argentinian authors and distributed in Buenos Aires. The history of these texts is a history of transit of images, texts, concepts, people, to and from Argentina. In those years, Argentinian authors travelled to Europe and the United States, where they met recent art that was produced in those places. Before and after travelling they were in contact with these productions and the ideas developed at art centres through the magazines that reached Buenos Aires. They were also visited by international figures such as Pierre Restany and Lawrence Alloway, whose word had a strong influencewhen defining and explaining the new artistic trends. Travelling outside of Argentina and getting updated knowledge of what was beingproduced abroad determined the agenda discussed by critics in those years. However, the importance that the proposals of Argentinian artists triggered off on these reflections can not be ignored. The new trends seem to have complied with the urgent task of 'updating' the critics demanded from the Argentinian artists a few years ago. Guidelines for assessing local art had been settled during the twentieth century by what was happening mainly in Europe and particularly in France.However, the sixties would change this mapping to name the United States as the other pole of importanceto be considered regarding the linkage of Argentinian art and art abroad. Pop art was considered by the Argentinian authors as eminently American art. However, the question about the existence of an Argentinian pop, happening or 'art of the media' and about the place it occupies in a scenario that probes to be, more than ever, ?internationalized?, is presented in approaches proposed by the Argentinian authors. The scope of critical production itself is reviewed by the authors because their object of study showed at least three declensions: European, U.S. and Argentina. Sociological and existential approaches, such as that undertaken by Luis Felipe Noé, structural-semiotic analysis by Oscar Masotta and philosophical by Jorge Romero Brest, would be the new access to the phenomena. While their styles and objectives on the texts differ, some common starting points can be identified on the three authors: the idea and the problemposed onthe formalist criticism that 'anything can be a work of art', the evidence of new points of contact between high culture and low culture, the finding of the 'explosion of boundaries between genres of expression', evidenced by the proliferation and, in some cases, short life of the denominations. What differences are highlighted, then, to distinguish the Argentinian pop from pop 'in general? As argued by A. Longoni, Masotta is careful to qualify as 'pop' experiences initiated by the Argentinians. Regarding the work of Emilio Renart, for instance, Masotta questions the importance of the artist´s social origin and the nationality of the work. In this way, he retrieves the notions proposed by Restany after his first visit to Argentina referring to local artists: they are called 'image makers' and are considered a manifestation of a particular 'urban folklore'. His works are comparable to those of their foreign counterparts: you can draw a parallel between the dolls of Juan Stoppani and certain works of Martial Raysse while Carlos Squirru is related to Lichtenstein and Wesselman for his critique of modern image. When Masotta writes about Marta Minujín, Luis Felipe Noé and Julio Le Parc and their exhibitions in New York in 1966, he proposes that perhaps the Argentinians themselves consolidated 'the equivalent of pop art', given the relationship of his work has with the 'urban folklore' which frames it. If they were unable to do so in any case, the same is true about the French, German and Spanish artists, explains Masotta. For Romero Brest visiting the Venice Biennial in 1964 with Gildo Caputo was a revelation. While differences with regard to abstract expressionism had been merely 'skirmishes' and the artists of this trend could be considered 'more Europeanize' than what the Americans wanted to recognize, the real opposition was now about pop art, a flat and depersonalized art in which the European Caputo longed for ?the stamp of the artist.? Facing the positions of Europe and the United States, Romero decides to accept the two, ?as a good Latin American.? In his ?Relation and reflection on the Pop Art? in 1967 he does not include Argentinian artists. While acknowledging that there is a pop produced in the country, its artists don´t fall within the framework of analysis he proposes because they did not meet the ?psycho-sociological? conditions that gave rise to American pop. Noé looks at pop art in Antiestética but this is not the central theme of his book. Here the author argues that this is an American national art and that its appearance caused an impasse on the development of modern art, a traditionally European phenomenon. The American nationality of pop art challenge the supposed internationalism of modern art, which was, in fact, the international imposition of an European style. This scenario offers new options to the Argentinians: the nationalism of the United States is a lesson to follow as long as is not be taken as an own flag, once again imported, ?it´s not a matter of replacing the European by the American, as if for a child to become independent from his parents he puts himself in dependence of the big brother,? Noé writes. As noted by A. Giunta, the central challenge for Romero Brest is to secure a place on the international scene for Argentinian art and not to risk his own place as an authority as both, critic and manager in the local environment. From their perspective, the ?art of the media? that proposes a conceptual and dematerialized mode of existence, will be that which can be thought of as a real innovation in Argentina. In the approach proposed by Masotta, and considering his place in the artistic and intellectual environment, to resolve the existence of an 'Argentinian pop' is not a fundamental problem. But if we analyse the sources studied, the repertoire of references and the analysis model proposed, we understand that his search is geared to rethink his own place as a producer of theory. Masotta analyses, from Argentina, not just one type of American art itself but also the possibility of using a theoretical new tool to allow access to it from other perspectives. Noé, who had earlier proposed to create an avant-garde that was the expression of the local environment, would now to call the attention of both artists and critics. He reproached Masotta, in a letter of 1967 for not trying to produce a 'discrepant speech' and instead choosing to meet the passive role of 'cultural importer', repeating a gesture known among local intellectuals.