Artes y Letras, EL MERCURIO.
Waldemar Sommer.

With respect to the traditionally poor quality of foreign exhibitions – it seems like our Los Andes mountain stops them-, the year that just ended did not get better. Only four with unique artworks result worth talking about. In first place, the work from the great sculpture artist, a contemporary British, Tony Cragg. His fantastic metamorphosis of the object deserved our award Premio Del Circulo de Criticos de Arte. Other valuable visits were, on the other hand, glances to the past: the Spanish archeological pieces and Russian icons from the XV to the XVIII century. Let’s add the actual Korean art sample, heading by the hurtful men of Dangwood Lee and for the video around the dollar, of Joonho Jeon. The rest of the more attractive visitant groups limited themselves to multiple edition work: the excellent homage to Picasso –printings of the best artists of the XX century-, the two actual German photography groups-Höfer, Polke, the Beckers, etc.-, the Suisse photographer retrospective-North American Robert Frank. Of Sao Paulo’s Biennial’s uneven selection, we have to highlight Pieter Hugo’s photos and Abdessemet’s videos, from Abdul.

The national ambit did produce various important exhibitions. In sculpture, Francisca Nuñez’s retrospective and delirious botched paintings amazed. Another journey over a decade it’s being dedicated to Marta Colvin. Teresa Gazitua presented herself with recent volumes –stoned metaphor of the Chilean river-, Tatiana Alamos and her exotic culture mix, pretty wooden work from De la Puente, the “cochayuyos” from Lise Moller, Marcela Correa, David Cofré, Javier Arentsen and a new name, Mauricio Garrido, with boxes and an ensemble about E. A. Poe.

The graphic had Eduardo Vilches’s powerful silhouettes, the inventive Javiera Moreira, the cinematographic posters from the pair Muñoz-Villena, work from Oscar Concha and Jorge Lankin. There’s also promising newness, from Constanza Cox, Adelaida Larraín, Andrés Heisen and Manuel Feliú.

In the video genre, the interesting ones came from the unknown Ingrid Wildi – documentaries- and Alicia Villarreal –neighborhood museum-. The Chilean photographer reached big moments with the exciting “Cautivas” from Jorge Brantmayer, with the rigorous photomontages from Sachiyo Nishimura, and the singular views from Silva-Avaria. A date joined photographers from France, Argentina and Chile. The installations, for their part, found artists like Godoy and Rosennmann –splendid “The Beautiful Lieutenant”-, like Beatriz Leyton- figurative illusion with lights and pins-, Aninat-Swinburn, Rubén Castillo, Josefina Fontecilla, Yennifer Becerra and Isidora Correa. Bárbara Palomino was an attractive beginner.

Una cita reunió, asimismo, fotógrafos de Francia, Argentina y Chile. Las instalaciones, por su parte, hallaron ejecutores como Godoy y Rosennmann -espléndido “El Teniente Bello”-, como Beatriz Leyton-ilusión figurativa con luces y alfileres-, Aninat-Swinburn, Rubén Castillo, Josefina Fontecilla, Yennifer Becerra e Isidora Correa. Bárbara Palomino fue una atrayente primeriza.

It remains to highlight the positive in the pictorial area. Let’s start with the artists with future: Maite Izquierdo, Salvador Amenábar, Felipe Cusicanqui and Patricia Claro. On the other extremes were the retrospectives from Roser Bru –always with claw-, the large group of Carlos Altamirano, and the very reduced of Matilde Pérez, Ruperto Cádiz and René Poblete.

Already inside the recent painting samples, it is worth to remember José Balmes’s work –in plain operation-, Roberto Geisse –homage to the stone-, Ricardo Yrarrázaval –the man under the digital view-, Rodrigo Cabezas, Gracia Barrios, Ximena Cousiño – unexpected progress-, Bruna Truffa and her ironic Chinese incarnation, Jorge Tacla, Josefina Guilistasti, Eliana Simonetti’s collages, Catalina Prado’s dreams, Patricia Israel’s swans; Benmayor, Pablo Chiuminatto, Leonardo Murialdo, Paz Lira, Angela Leible and her horses.