Modernism and Antonio Berni<\/em><\/p>\n This is only a tiny selection of a rich display of modern Argentinian art that was remarkable discovery for a first-time visitor in that country.<\/p>\n These works by Berni are part of an exposition on Argentinian Modernism from 1940 to 1970.\u00a0 The dates are important because modernism came to an end in the 1970\u2019s with the military dictatorship and the \u201cdirty war.\u201d<\/p>\n Argentina, like other dictatorships, had an uneasy relationship with artists \u2014 especially leftists.\u00a0 Virtually all the modern art by Spaniards was done abroad during the Franco regime (e.g., Picasso).\u00a0 Brazilian art and music were often exiled along with the political opposition, though they were less likely to be tortured and \u201cdisappeared\u201d than political opponents and opposition journalists.\u00a0 In the same way, Argentina\u2019s \u201cdirty war\u201d inflicted thousands of casualties and disappearances on its own citizens.<\/p>\n This makes the modernist exhibit in Buenos Aires all the more poignant.\u00a0 It was a period of artistic and political ferment.\u00a0 There are many artists in the display, not all of whom are \u201cpolitical,\u201d even though their styles may not have been popular with the dictatorship.\u00a0 Antonio Berni is one whose themes seemed to jump off the wall.<\/p>\n Berni and many of his\u00a0 fellow artists were aware of developments in European art, but had a strong critical identity of their own.\u00a0 Berni was a committed leftist before the left came under the dictatorship, ending opposition and opposition art.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n This is just a personal opinion, but Berni\u2019s work evokes elements of the satirical\/critical work of Georg Grosz, the German artist of the Weimar era (though he continued his career in the United States later).\u00a0 It is deeply graphic and emotional, and sometimes borders on propaganda\/poster graphics.\u00a0 Berni does not have the satirical edge of Grosz, however, and is more literally outraged at injustice of the authoritarian regime and its oppression of opposition.\u00a0 Grosz often expressed his opposition to German militarism and Nazism in satire and expressionist humor.\u00a0 Berni\u2019s work has some similarity to German expressionist work of the time, but whatever satire is present takes the form of religious imagery and political outrage.<\/p>\n The Argentinian commentary says he was associated with \u201cinformalism\u201d and \u201cNew Figuration.\u201d\u00a0 These schools of art were fermenting in Argentina, but were aware of graphic movements elsewhere in the world.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0 The Buenos Aires Museu Nacional de Bellas Artes Modernism and Antonio Berni This is only a tiny selection of a rich display of modern Argentinian art that was remarkable discovery for a first-time visitor in that country. These works by Berni are part of an exposition on Argentinian Modernism from 1940 to 1970.\u00a0 The … Continue reading Argentine modernist artists, Buenos Aires Museum of Fine Arts<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-art-in-brazil-and-latin-america"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1668"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1668\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1724,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1668\/revisions\/1724"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"IMG_8158\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.meredithwwatts.com\/MWBrazilBlog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/IMG_8158.jpg\")
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