The exhibition Southern Geometries, from Mexico to Patagonia celebrates the wealth of color and diversity of styles in the geometric art of Latin America, bringing together 250 artworks made by over 70 artists from the Pre-Columbian period to present. Including modernist abstract art, sculpture and architecture as well as ceramics, weaving, and body painting, the exhibition explores the wide range of approaches to geometric abstraction in Latin America, whether influenced by Pre-Columbian art, the European avant-garde or Amerindian cultures. Southern Geometries weaves visual relationships among diverse cultures and regions across time, inviting visitors to discover the vibrant patterns and designs of Latin American art.
Curated by Andrés Gutiérrez Usillos, this exhibition focuses on an anonymous portrait of c. 1670. The work represents Doña María Luisa de Toledo, daughter of the Marquis of Mancera, Viceroy of New Spain, accompanied by a tattooed Indigenous woman. The show explores the world of the women portrayed in the painting, for example by reconstructing Doña María Luisa de Toledo’s trousseau, composed mainly of American and Asian items acquired in Mexico. The presentation thus analyses the clashes and encounters among the different worlds which coexisted in Viceregal America from a rare female perspective.
Click here for more information, and here for an exhibition brochure.
Roma en México/México en Roma is divided in eight sections: La fábrica del prestigio discusses Rome’s legitimising power; Obras de viaje is dedicated to the import of exemplary paintings and sculptures from Rome to Mexico; Dramatis personae presents the portrait as the most sought-after genre in the period; Virtud de los clásicos focuses on the importance of Greek and Latin literature in inspiring iconographies; La riqueza del pueblo is a display of works after the live model; La escuela del paisaje includes landscapes by the Hungarian painter Károly Markó El Viejo, among others; La internacional del arte sacro contains religious paintings by students of the Academia de San Carlos; El espectáculo de la historia concludes the exhibition with major historical works.
The show foregrounds works by Mexican artists, from the lesser-known Tomás Pérez, Primitivo Miranda, Tiburcio Sánchez and Epitacio Calvo, to better-known personalities such as Juan Cordero. Francesco Coghetti, Francesco Podesti and Giovanni Silvagni are examples of Roman painters whose works arrived in Mexico and were used to illustrate the art of painting to students of the Academia.
A major publication by Campisano Editore accompanies the exhibition, acting as both an exhibition catalogue and a scholarly introduction to this under-researched topic.
The Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage (KIK-IRPA) in Brussels, in collaboration with the Université Catholique de Louvain (UCL), organises the first conference in Belgium devoted to Iberian polychromed sculpture and its relation to other Europeans regions. Referring to UCL’s Spanish sculpture collections, this conference brings together scholars specialised in the sculpture from Spain, Belgium, Italy and Mexico. The speakers will trace the sculptures from their production, their technics, their links and reception in other European regions.
1. Lectures (Auditoire du Musée L)
09:15-09:50 – Welcome
09:50-10:00 – Introduction remarks – Eduardo Lamas-Delgado (Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage, Brussels)
The polychrome Sculpture in Spain and Latin America (chairwoman, Abigail Newman, Universiteit Antwerpen)
10:00-10:20 – Manuel García Luque (Universidad de Granada), El escultor Pedro de Mena y el naturalismo matérico
10:20-10:40 – Pablo Amador (Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas, Universidad Nacional de México), Aspectos técnicos de la escultura policromada hispánica
10:40-11:00 – Géraldine Patigny (Université Libre de Bruxelles – Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage, Brussels), La sculpture polychromée espagnole dans les collections belges
11:00-11:15 – Questions and debate
11:15-11:30 – Coffee break
The Spanish polychrome Sculpture and Europe (chairman, Ralph Dekoninck, Université Catholique de Louvain)
11:30-11:50 – Roberto Alonso Moral (Universidad Complutense de Madrid), La migración de escultura entre Nápoles y España durante el siglo XVII y su impacto: algunos problemas de identificación
11:50-12:10 – Wendy Frère (Université Libre de Bruxelles), La polychromie dans la sculpture baroque des anciens Pays-Bas méridionaux et la Principauté de Liège
12:10-12:30 – Holly Trusted (Victoria and Albert Museum, London), Passion and Prejudice: Attitudes towards Spanish Sculpture in Britain in the Nineteenth Century
12:30-12:40 – Questions and debate
12:45-13:45 – Lunch
2. Study session: the Spanish Medieval and Early Renaissance Sculptures from Val-Duchesse (chairwoman, Corinne Van Hauwermeiren, CONSERVART)
14:00-15:00 Emmanuelle Mercier (Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage, Brussels), Erika Rabello (Royal Institute for Cultural Heritage, Brussels), Mathieu Somon (Université Catholique de Louvain).
15:00-15:15 – Questions and debate
15:15-15:30 – Concluding remarks
3. Visit to the Museum Collection
Free, booking required. Click here to reserve a place and for more information.
1968 is a turning point for many countries that experienced the effects of the desire for revolution of young people, who had been born after the Second World War and did not feel the commitment of historical debt to those events and the type of life that was founded after. The Mexican case was especially painful because the student and social claims were violently repressed by the state forces that ended in what is known as the Tlatelolco massacre. On October 2 1968, more than three hundred people were killed by the army. This bloody response volatilized the desire for change and led to the start of the Olympics in Mexico, which took place between October 12 and 27, making Mexico a place visited by athletes from all over the world.
The programme will be introduced with a documentary by director Nicolás Echeverría, which recovers the voice of its protagonists, the informative display of the events and some conclusions and interpretations about them, thirty years later. Memorial del 68 allows us to understand the complexity of this year in which young Mexicans tried to change the world. Other documentary films complete the programme, which will be extended over four evenings in October, always followed by conversations with the public, a collaboration between the Institute of Mexican Studies / UNAM in London and the Cervantes Institute in London.
For more information about events in the series, click here.
Open until 4 November 2018, this exhibition presents an extraordinary collection of personal artefacts and clothing belonging to the iconic Mexican artist Frida Kahlo. Locked away for 50 years after her death, this collection has never before been exhibited outside Mexico. Click here to book tickets and see related events.
The vitality and inventiveness of artists in eighteenth-century New Spain (Mexico) is the focus of Pinxit Mexici, an exhibition which presents some 110 works of art (primarily paintings), many of which are unpublished and newly restored. The exhibition surveys the most important artists and stylistic developments of the period and highlights the emergence of new pictorial genres and subjects. It is the first major exhibition devoted to this neglected topic.
The exhibition is divided in thematic sections: Great Masters; Masters Storytellers and the Art of Expression; Noble Pursuits and the Academy; Paintings of the Land; The Power of Portraiture; The Allegorical World; Imagining the Sacred.
The exhibition Southern Geometries, from Mexico to Patagonia celebrates the wealth of color and diversity of styles in the geometric art of Latin America, bringing together 250 artworks made by over 70 artists from the Pre-Columbian period to present. Including modernist abstract art, sculpture and architecture as well as ceramics, weaving, and body painting, the exhibition explores the wide range of approaches to geometric abstraction in Latin America, whether influenced by Pre-Columbian art, the European avant-garde or Amerindian cultures. Southern Geometries weaves visual relationships among diverse cultures and regions across time, inviting visitors to discover the vibrant patterns and designs of Latin American art.
The exhibition 
Open until 4 November 2018, this exhibition presents an extraordinary collection of personal artefacts and clothing belonging to the iconic Mexican artist Frida Kahlo. Locked away for 50 years after her death, this collection has never before been exhibited outside Mexico. Click 
