Sistema Regional de Información
en línea para Revistas Científicas de América Latina,
el Caribe, España y Portugal

Introduction: Amidst the context of digital production, the variety of voices represented from non-written possibilities gain vitality, while they experiment with sound, visual, and corporal expression that communicate themselves through, traverse, and transgress cinematographic language. Within these considerations, a blind spot arises when these texts (documentaries) are discussed from the academy: the practices of distribution, curatorship and promotion of films are generally marginalized, taking away the prominence of the life cycle of these productions. How are these challenges experienced in contemporary productions in Central America and the Caribbean? Objective: This paper analyzes some narrative and aesthetic resources in documentaries that represent Afrolatin characters. Methods: The study summarizes and selects texts made from Martinique, Grenada, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica, making visible old and new resources that allude to references from local and global perspectives. Results: It builds a context that contributes to the focus on characters, conflicts, and historical scenarios of the Afro-descendant community in Central America and the Caribbean. Conclusions: The documentaries reflect on trajectories and historical conditions that problematize identities and struggles while bringing dignity to the represented subjects and communities. Their curatorship strengthens the link between audiences and texts to expand the dialogue around them.

Introduction: Art and artists have played a central role in the process of symbolizing the Nation-State. Pedro Arrieta (1954-2004) belongs to a generation of Costa Rican artists who developed innovative forms of expression, in dialogue with contemporary social conflicts and a critical vision of the official narratives of national identity. Objective: This paper aims to contribute to the discussions on contemporary art and national identity, based on the analysis of the work of Pedro Arrieta, especially his art installation Símbolos Patrios. Methods: The news, chronicles, reviews and interviews published in the newspapers La República, La Nación and Semanario Universidad between 1990 and 2013 were examined along with the artist’s catalogue and other national and international works that have addressed the link between contemporary art and politics. Conclusions: Arrieta, both in his individual work and in his participation within the Bocaracá collective, was a fundamental character in the displacement of Costa Rican art at the end of the 20th century. Its consecration and institutional legitimation within the framework of the national sculpture Biennials, as well as its international projection, enhanced the dialogues and discussions on topics of his emphasis, such as national identity and the Costa Rican idiosyncrasy.

Introduction: Drawing on contributions from the Philosophy of technology and the ontological turn, this paper examines various machine configurations developed within the field of contemporary Latin American art. Objective: The study analyzes, from formal, technical, material, and conceptual perspectives, a selection of artworks that subvert the behavior of the modern machine, established since the Industrial Revolution as a productive, efficient, and utilitarian artifact. Methods: The analysis adopted a qualitative methodology based on bibliographic survey, theoretical systematization, critical inquiry of the works, and fieldwork with an ethnographic approach consisting of semi-structured interviews with the artists and direct observations. Results: Two lines of production are identified: artworks that constitute useless machines and artifacts that establish a new ontology of machine devoted to non-instituted purposes. Conclusions: Both lines displace the anthropocentric primacy and advocate for the ontological equality of machines, which assume active roles in a network of dynamic relations with human and non-human agencies.

For a significant part of Costa Rican history, national music was developed within military bands, not only in terms of training performers, honing skills, and popularizing a musical culture, but also in terms of creation. Compositions serving political figures, institutions, and elements of popular culture gradually formed our musical heritage, which the Archivo Histórico Musical of the Escuela de Artes Musicales preserves, studies, and revives, and which Cuadernos de las Artes now presents in this series of studies by Iván Chinchilla Meza. This fourth Cuaderno de las Artes is evidence of this work to rescue our musical heritage, in this case, dedicated to the work of composer Roberto Cantillano Vindas (1887-1955), who was a flutist in the military bands of Alajuela and San José, as well as director of the San José Military Band (1919-1936) and general director of Costa Rica's bands (1936-1948). It was during his time as conductor that he explored his talent as a composer, which is now being recovered, studied, and brought to the present for the enjoyment of new generations.

Introduction: The III Biennial of Sculpture of the Cervecería Costa Rica (III BECCR) highlighted the tensions within the Costa Rican artistic field, characterized by the confrontation between modern and contemporary paradigms. Objective: This paper aims to analyze these dynamics through a theoretical framework that includes the concepts of social fields and habitus (Bourdieu, 2008). Methods: The methodology employed consists of a review of the official catalog of the event, which serves as a basis for categorizing and extracting information about the works and participating artists. Results: The results reveal a list of works and a reflection on the subjectivities and tensions among different actors in the artistic field. Through an autoethnographic exercise, the author shares their experience as a sculpture student at that time, allowing for a critical perspective on changes observed over the years. Conclusions: The conclusions highlight the need to recognize the coexistence of both paradigms in Costa Rican art and to make visible the contributions of empirical artistic producers and the general public, who often remain marginalized in this context.

Introduction: The cover of a novel contains mediation in which the design and the illustration are the result of the vision of those who made it. Once approved, it is transformed into a visual narrative constituted by a succession of relations of similarity, disposition or opposition with what it discursively contains. Objective: The paper analyzes a visual corpus of the covers of Prisión verde (editions from 1950 to 2010) and Destacamento rojo (editions from 1962 to 2018) by Ramón Amaya Amador. Methods: According to Genette, paratextuality assumes the existence of a surface on which a cultural text and its subsequent edition are created. This is examined through the variability of images, which determines the reception environment and the represented iconography of banana exploitation. Results: The semiotics of the covers links the predominant aesthetics in the labor representation of the Honduran working class from two perspectives: the self-perception of the problematized situation in Amaya Amador’s narrative and the foreign illustrations, in which the gaze of another alien to the sociohistorical and geographical context in Honduras predominates. Conclusions: Revisiting banana novels from the paratextual element implies an exercise in memory and textuality where representations of the local world and its exploitation are inserted within the narrative discourse of denunciation.

Introduction: Since 1959, Cuban cinema has become one of the most influential cinematographies of the continent. Marked by trends such as Neorealism and the New Wave, it developed an important social outlook on different national and continental issues. However, since the beginning of the 21st century, its production points in other directions that do not contribute to this referential image. Objective: The paper aims to analyze how the economic crisis, the lack of resources, the progressive emigration, and the State pressure from its cultural policies constitute some of the causes that affect this reality. Methods: Historical-logical and critical analysis methods were employed. Results: The study demonstrates that the current Cuban cinema is immersed in a production and creation crisis, as well as under certain hegemonic pressures. Conclusions: Finally, it is determined that its capacity for social gazes and aesthetic experimentation has been reduced in recent years.

Introduction: The plantation has guided the course of the history of Caribbean countries and has had an impact on the visuality of Caribbean art. Objective: The paper addresses the conceptual topics wielded by the plantation as a rhetorical figure in contemporary Caribbean art. Methods: A field study of Caribbean artists who have worked with the plantation was carried out in order to deploy an iconographic-iconological analysis, with a biographical and historical character in a selection of works. Results: The iconography possessed by the history of art, the narratives of the imaginary and the conjunction of artistic supports with agro-industrial products or residues are present in the artistic-decolonial practices of Caribbean creators. Conclusions: Art critically evidences the historical omnipresence of the plantation by addressing the harmful effects on the environment, the colonial remnants in cultural memory, in social relations, and in the constitution of identities.

Introduction: This paper examines how Mexico employed cultural diplomacy during the IV Centenary of the Discovery of America in 1892, an event in Spain where the Mexican government sought to enhance the country’s visibility in an international gathering. It has been recognized as one of the most significant milestones of Hispanism. Objective: This study aims to analyze the participation of the Mexican military band of the 8th Cavalry Regiment, whose headquarters were in the capital of the state of Michoacán, Morelia. Moreover, it aims to examine the military band as a symbol of national identity and contributor of the consolidation of a narrative of progress and stability. Methods: Using an interdisciplinary approach, the study employs historical-documentary methods, musicological analysis, and cultural diplomacy studies, drawing on primary and secondary sources, such as historical press and official records. Results: The military band, under the direction of Captain José Encarnación Payén, served as a cultural ambassador for Mexico, receiving recognition in Spain and establishing networks that strengthened the bilateral relations between the countries. Conclusions: The 1892 celebrations demonstrated the success of music as a diplomatic tool, allowing Mexico to integrate into the international stage and deepen its historical and cultural ties with Spain.

Introduction: This reflection proposes a balance on some fundamental theoretical-methodological decisions and considerations for developing research on art in and from Central America. Development: First, it highlights the importance of oral sources and access to archives in historical-cultural research processes, emphasizing their capacity to offer a living, situated, and contextual dimension of artistic production. Additionally, it reflects on the ethical and political implications of working with cultural archives and memory in Central America, understanding this work as an action that goes beyond methodology to position itself in the realm of the political. As an example, a case study focused on the history of modern art collections in national museums and the circulation of artists from Costa Rica and Guatemala in international circuits during the second half of the 20th century is presented. Conclusion: From this experience, the methodological challenges and lessons derived from working with archives and oral histories are discussed, highlighting the urgency to preserve and value these sources for a richer understanding of the Central American artistic and cultural legacy. Reflecting on these practices invites us to recognize that research is also a form of political and ethical action that contributes to making visible subjectivities and historical memories.