Tuesday, October 29, 1996
ART:
Opening museum centers on contemporary Latin American artistsBy
Alicia Cheak
Daily Bruin Contributor
New beginnings are exciting. On Nov. 2, the Latin American Art
Museum will treat the public to a taste of two of its four
galleries as a preview of what will be fully operational by the
summer of ’97.
The new museum is the brainchild of Long Beach philanthropist
Robert Gumbiner, and will be one of the few institutions in the
United States and even rarer on the West Coast, which will devote
itself to the representation of contemporary Latin American
art.
"Mr. Gumbiner has been collecting Latin American art for over
three decades," Patricia House, CEO of the museum, explains. "He
wanted very much to have a place to exhibit and study art and to
put his permanent collection."
Contemporary Latin American art is underrepresented in the
United States and it is a deficiency made more conspicuous when we
consider the large Latino population in Los Angeles. And when there
are exhibitions, they only pay tribute to venerated artists like
Diego Rivera, Jose Clemente Orozco and David Alfaro. The museum
wants to go beyond that.
"[Contemporary] is an area that needs scholarship; it needs
criticism and development," Cynthia McMullin explains. McMullin is
the co-curator of one of the exhibitions that will open this
Saturday.
"We have so many institutions that are showing Latin American
art and offer large collections of pre-Columbian and colonial. The
contemporary needs understanding, and our exhibitions can help in
addressing this academic need."
House agrees. "What seems to be done fairly adequately are
exhibits of pre-Columbian or colonial material, but then it seems
like everything stops," she says. "And it’s really unfortunate that
we’re not trying to stay in touch and exhibit material from the
contemporary visions of the cultures of Latin America."
As a culturally specific museum, LAAM can narrow its artistic
focus and represent areas which might otherwise remain obscure.
"Everyone knows Tamayo, but not all of the artists represented
are necessarily household names," McMullin says. "And it’s very
exciting because of the fact that (modern Latin American art) has
not been well investigated."
By tapping into this rather novel niche, LAAM will offer a more
intensified cultural experience of contemporary art for the
visitor.
"This is one place that scholars, visitors or students could
look to if they really wanted to see and experience the present
character of Latin American art," says House, who believes that the
exhibitions and lectures will generate discussion and greater
research and understanding of contemporary art.
Of the two galleries to open this weekend, the first will house
an exhibition on Mexican figurative art since 1950.
"This collection will give understanding to the origins and
symbols of what we know now as contemporary," McMullin says.
Included in the collection are works from Jose Luis Cuevas and
Rafael Coronel, who belong to a movement known as La Raptura.
"La Raptura, or ‘the break,’ was a very independent and
strong-voiced group of artists that are completely breaking away
from anything Mexican," Mcmullin explains.
By Mexican, she is referring to the modernist foundations
defined by Diego Rivera and other muralists.
And while the museum is militant in its philosophy of
representing contemporary works, antiquity will still find its way
in. Accompanying the preview gallery, "Dia de los Muertos" will
have an altar constructed by Juan Coronel Diego in tribute of his
grandfather, Diego Rivera.
Although Rivera is assigned to the modernist period, his
influence in the direction and nature of contemporary Mexican art
renders him and his grandson essential participants in the
commemorative celebrations.
"The altar is done as a dedication to the museum, to the fact
that the museum is opening up," House says.
"Like a pyramid, it speaks of the importance of the
pre-Columbian influences of Latin American art and is decorated
with folk art, flowers, seeds  things which represent life,"
he adds.
The museum store, Teseros de Arte, will also welcome its first
visitors on Saturday. Deborah Boudreau, Teseros’ store manager, has
gathered together a wide range of saleable art for the people to
take home with them  a memento of their trip.
"It’s just like going to an art gallery," Boudreau says,
"because you get to see all these works, the pieces that are in
there being quite lovely and quite good examples of what’s
represented in the museum." And what is being represented is a new,
rich history of Latin American art that has been too long in
coming.
Latin American Art Museum is located at 628 Alamitos Ave., Long
Beach. Open Wednesday-Saturday, 11:30 a.m.-7:30 p.m.; Sunday,
12:00-4:00 p.m. Preview opening on Nov. 2 & 3. "Free Directions
in Mexican Figurative Art Since 1950" runs until Jan 5, 1997. "An
Altar for Diego" is on view until Dec 1. For more info., call (310)
437-1689.
ITURRALDE GALLERY
A detail of "Albina," an oil and sand on canvas by Francisco
Toledo.