A Celebration Of Latin-American Art

Groundbreaking Exhibit In Philadelphia Museum Showcases Works From 1492-1820

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PHILADELPHIA, Sept. 18, 2006 | by Judy Faber

(AP)  The culture clash between Old Europe and the New World produced extraordinarily rich and diverse works of art.

"Tesoros/Treasures/Tesouros: The Arts in Latin America, 1492-1820," which opens Wednesday at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, spans the complex period from Christopher Columbus' arrival in the New World to the late colonial era by examining art from 13 countries. Though not the first such exhibit, museum officials said it encompasses the broadest geographic scope ever assembled.

"Many shows have been done along more vertical, national lines — Mexican art, Guatemalan art," curator Joseph Rishel said. "Our bias was to take a horizontal approach and cross all these 19th-century boundaries."

The exhibit — four years in the making — includes about 250 secular and religious works from private and public collections, including masterful paintings and silver crafts, a pair of soaring gilded altar pieces, lush tapestries from Guatemala and Peru, pottery and sculptures from Brazil and Ecuador, as well as manuscripts, maps and ornately embellished furniture.

Lacquered screens, clerical vestments adorned with iridescent feathers, and furniture inlaid with tortoise shell, mother-of-pearl and ivory highlight the European, African and Asian elements that quickly melded with Latin American art, craftsmanship, subject matter and technique.

Rishel said the exhibit aims to re-orient visitors about commonly held notions on the differences between European and indigenous cultures, and renew focus on artists who have been marginalized because of their countries of origin.

"Our attempt was to do a ... taster menu of works of art (that) we take to be the best of their kind," said Rishel, who with curator Suzanne Stratton-Pruit assembled the show with assistance from scholars in the United States, Spain, Mexico and Ecuador.

The effect of cross-cultural collisions can be seen among Europeans and the native populations of the then Spanish viceroyalties of New Spain (now Mexico and Central America) and Peru (now Ecuador, Uruguay, Paraguay, Colombia, Chile, Argentina, Bolivia and Peru), and in the Portuguese colony of Brazil.

The show's timeline begins at the time of Columbus' historic expedition, which sparked a network joining trade routes between Africa, Asia and Europe to the Americas.

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