Abstraction has been a recurring strategy in Latin American visual cultures since long before the European Conquest. Over the past century, and often in dialogue with artists elsewhere, Latin Americans working in diverse media have explored both abstraction or – in the case of the Concrete art movement, who rejected the term “abstract” art as too suggestive of a link to a figurative realm that is being abstracted – “pure” explorations of color and form. Not surprisingly, filmmakers have participated actively in this process of exploration, often in collaboration with artists from other media.

Program:

• Placeres de la Carne (Horacio Valleregio, Argentina, 1977, 12 min.)

• Becky’s Eye (Willie Varela, US, 1977, 3 min., silent)

• Nuestra señora de Paris (Teo Hernández, France, 1981-1982, 22 min.)

• Cosmorama (Enrique Pineda Barnet, Cuba, 1965, 5 min.)

• Electric Arthropods (Manuel DeLanda, US, 2017, 4 min.)

• As without so within (Manuela de Laborde, Mexico/US/UK, 2016, 25 min)