Free Art Talk: Futurism and Vanguardia

Join us for this special program in conjunction with our exhibition ’The Avant-Garde Networks of Amauta: Argentina, Mexico, and Peru in the 1920s.’ We will be joined by guest speaker Dr. Lynda C. Klich (Assistant Professor of Art History, Hunter College, The City University of New York).

This talk examines the relationship between Latin American vanguardistas and Italian Futurism, charting their shifting relationships. Using the examples of the Mexican art and literary movement estridentismo, the Argentine martinfierrista group, the Brazilian modernistas, and José Carlos Mariátegui’s Amauta circle, it examines the terms of provocative posturing by the futurist founder F.T. Marinetti that inspired young Latin American intellectuals. A further exploration delves into how the increasing opposition to his fascist leanings by these young leaders allowed them to define the terms for vanguardism in the region.

This event will take place in Capitol Room located in our Smith building across the plaza from the museum. Thursdays are free admission at the museum. The Blanton is located at the intersection of Congress Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.

Paid parking is available in the Brazos Garage on Brazos Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. Parking is $4; bring your ticket with you to the museum.

ABOUT LYNDA KLICH

Lynda Klich is an art historian specializing in twentieth-century art. At Hunter College, CUNY she teaches classes on art in Latin America from the colonial period to the present day. Her research addresses topics such as vanguardism, transnational networks between Latin America, the US, and Europe, the relationships between culture and politics, nationalism and identity, and modernism and popular culture. Her work on estridentismo has appeared in major exhibition catalogues, including Into the Night: Cabarets and Clubs in Modern Art (Barbican Art Gallery, London and Belvedere, Vienna, 2019), Redes de vanguardia. Amauta y América Latina, 1926-1930 (Lima: Museo de Arte de Lima/Austin: Blanton Museum of Art, 2019) and Paint the Revolution: Mexican Modernism, 1910–1950 (Philadelphia Museum of Art/Palacio de Bellas Artes, 2016). Her new book project concerns colonial revivalism in painting, decorative arts, architecture, and urban planning in postrevolutionary Mexico. Klich is also the curator of the Leonard A. Lauder Postcard Collection, the subject of various collaborative projects with the MFA Boston, including The Propaganda Front: Postcards from the Era of World Wars (2017) and The Postcard Age: Selections from the Leonard A. Lauder Collection (2012). She is currently preparing an exhibition and catalogue on vernacular U.S. photography in postcards, opening at the MFA Boston in January 2021.