The Wolfsonian–Florida International University announces the release of the 26th issue of its award-winning Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Arts this April 2010. The Mexico theme issue, distributed internationally by Penn State University Press, explores new perspectives on twentieth-century Mexican art and visual culture. It brings together research on understudied developments in architecture, painting, decorative arts, propaganda, and other media, and reveals that Mexican modernism was more multifaceted than is typically proposed.
Since 1986, the Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Arts has been dedicated to fostering new scholarship for the period 1875 to 1945 and parallels themes contained in the collection of The Wolfsonian. Latin America has been an area of particular interest, demonstrated by past special theme issues on Argentina (1992), Brazil (1995), and Cuba (1996). This attention to Latin America is only natural, given that the Journal is edited and published in a city sometimes known as the “gateway to the Americas,” a place whose culture has been enriched by its connections to these regions; and that it belongs to a university that has made a major commitment to advancing scholarship about the Caribbean, Central America, and South America. The latest issue of the Journal continues this emphasis by addressing modern Mexico.
The publication of the Mexico theme issue coincides with the one-hundredth anniversary of the Mexican Revolution. The Journal’s 26th issue includes11 richly illustrated essays that look beyond the most well-known aspects of post-Revolutionary Mexican culture—especially muralism and the search for a national identity based on an idealized indigenous peasant class. The publication also provides an expanded portrait of the so-called Mexican Renaissance. It addresses diverse aesthetic and social proposals that embraced technological modernity, challenged gender hierarchies, employed aesthetic innovation, and entered dialogue with international currents. And it gives attention to both internationally famous individuals (such as Diego Rivera and Luis Barragán) and to less well-known figures who made significant contributions to Mexican culture—such as the painter Fermín Revueltas, the caricaturist Ernesto García Cabral, and the furniture designer Michael van Beuren. By presenting this cast of characters, the essays provide a sense of the diversity and energy that characterized Mexican cultural life in the twentieth century.
Mitchell Wolfson, Jr., founded both The Wolfsonian and the Journal in order to give “decorative and propaganda arts” the attention they merit as significant cultural and political practices; and also to promote work by young scholars about regions that fall outside the main strengths of the museum’s collection. “With this issue, the Journal continues to build on the foundations that he established,” notes Cathy Leff, The Wolfsonian’s director.
Lynda Klich, visiting assistant professor at Hunter College, served as guest editor of the Journal and also contributed an essay about the group of artists and writers known as Estridentistas. “I think that one of the accomplishments of this publication is that it integrates the scholarship of US-based authors with those from Mexico and Europe,” said Klich. “It was the only way we could offer such a generous range of subjects and perspectives and acquaint readers with recent developments in international scholarship.” Jonathan Mogul, Andrew W. Mellon Coordinator of Academic Programs at The Wolfsonian, served as senior editor, and Tim Hossler, The Wolfsonian’s art director, designed the publication. Issue 26 of the Journal was sponsored by the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts; Furthermore: a program of the J.M. Kaplan Fund; and the Cowles Charitable Trust.
The essays in this volume are grouped into sections covering a broad range of concepts. Below is a glimpse into the Journal’s contents:
Liquid Walls: Stained Glass in Mexican Art, 1900-1935
Carla Zurián de la Fuente, art historian who currently works as a researcher at the Coordinación Nacional de Museos y Exposiciones, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia in Mexico City
The Best Maugard Drawing Method: A Common Ground for Modern Mexicanist Aesthetics
Karen Cordero Reiman, distinguished professor in art history at the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City
Caricature and Revolution in Mexico
Rafael Barajas (“El Fisgón”), editorial cartoonist for the newspaper La Jornada and for the political humor magazine El Chamuco
Estridentópolis: Achieving a Post-Revolutionary Utopia in Jalapa
Lynda Klich, teaches Latin American art history at Hunter College, CUNY, and is curator of the Leonard A. Lauder Postcard Collection
Industrial Landscapes in Modern Mexican Art
James Oles, divides his time between Mexico City and Wellesley College, where he teaches Latin American art and is adjunct curator at the Davis Museum and Cultural Center
Icons Behind Altars: María Izquierdo’s Devotional Imagery and the Modern Mexican Catholic Woman
Celeste Donovan, doctoral candidate at the CUNY Graduate Center
Inward Outward: Barragán in Transition
Federico Zanco, founder and director of the Barragan Foundation, in Birsfelden, Switzerland, and contributor to several architecture and design magazines
Juan O’Gorman: Architecture and Surface
Alejandro Hernández Gálvez, architect who lives and works in Mexico City, faculty at Universidad Anáhuac and Universidad Iberoamericana, and is a member of the Sistema Nacional de Creadores del Fondo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes
Van Beuren Furniture: From Bauhaus to the Homes of Modern Mexico
Ana Elena Mallet, independent curator and writer, and who is currently working on an exhibition and book about twentieth-century Mexican design for Fomento Cultural Banamex. She writes monthly columns for DF por Travesias and Open Magazine
Mathías Goeritz: Architecture, Monochrome, and Revolution
Luis E. Carranza, associate professor of architecture at Roger Williams University, Bristol, Rhode Island
Fighting it Out: Being Naco in the Global Lucha Libre
Esther Gabara, associate professor of romance studies, and art, art history & visual studies at Duke University
The 301-page publication, which features more than 200 illustrations, is already available in The Wolfsonian’s Dynamo Museum Shop ($50). To purchase Journal 26 and/or other back issues, contact paola@thewolf.fiu.edu or 305.535.2680.
In conjunction with this issue of the Journal, a trip to Mexico City is planned for late October 2010 through The Wolfsonian–Florida International University Alliance. The Alliance trips feature visits to significant exhibitions and private collections, with a focus on decorative, propaganda, and applied arts in the museum’s time frame. For information on the Mexico City trip, contact michael@thewolf.fiu.edu or 305.535.2602.