- Melissa Sesana
I. Introduction
This essay examines the use of grids and models in the work of Guillermo Kuitca as a way of addressing the relationship between people and space. By studying the use of floor plans, blueprints and maps I wish to draw a connection between Kuitca’s paintings and the literary work of fellow Argentines Julio Cortazar and Jorge Luis Borges. Ultimately, I explore how in both disciplines models and grids function as symbols of memory, isolation, exile and the human condition.
I. Introduction
This essay examines the use of grids and models in the work of Guillermo Kuitca as a way of addressing the relationship between people and space. By studying the use of floor plans, blueprints and maps I wish to draw a connection between Kuitca’s paintings and the literary work of fellow Argentines Julio Cortazar and Jorge Luis Borges. Ultimately, I explore how in both disciplines models and grids function as symbols of memory, isolation, exile and the human condition.
II. The Grid and the Model
The role of the grid in modern art is contentious. Its initial appearance in fifteenth-century studies of perspective established its role as an intermediary between art and science. After a period of hibernation the grid resurfaced in the 1900s not as a tool for perfecting the pictorial recreation of reality but rather as a central subject matter within painting itself. Influenced by Cubism, the rigid geometry of intersecting vertical and horizontal lines that dominated the De Stijl and Russian Constructivist movements – spearheaded by Piet Mondrian and Theo Van Doesburg, and Kazimir Malevich and Aleksandr Rodchenko respectively – came together under the umbrella term of geometric abstraction.[1] This tradition went on to permeate, and perhaps give rise to, subsequent movements in modern and contemporary art, including Abstract Expressionism, Minimalism and Conceptualism.
In her seminal essay “Grids”, Rosalind Krauss focuses on the ubiquity and purpose of the grid in modern art. Originally published in October in 1979, Krauss pinpoints the grid as the emblem of modernist ambition, stating that, “the grid announces, among other things, modern art’s will to silence, its hostility to literature, to narrative, to discourse.”[2] Throughout the first part of the text Krauss stresses the extent to which the grid represents an obstacle and thus a rupture between visual art and language and as such has impeded artistic development.[3] She goes on to claim that the grid is that which art becomes when it turns its back to nature, fostering work that is “antinatural, antimimetic, antireal.”[4]
The role of the grid in modern art is contentious. Its initial appearance in fifteenth-century studies of perspective established its role as an intermediary between art and science. After a period of hibernation the grid resurfaced in the 1900s not as a tool for perfecting the pictorial recreation of reality but rather as a central subject matter within painting itself. Influenced by Cubism, the rigid geometry of intersecting vertical and horizontal lines that dominated the De Stijl and Russian Constructivist movements – spearheaded by Piet Mondrian and Theo Van Doesburg, and Kazimir Malevich and Aleksandr Rodchenko respectively – came together under the umbrella term of geometric abstraction.[1] This tradition went on to permeate, and perhaps give rise to, subsequent movements in modern and contemporary art, including Abstract Expressionism, Minimalism and Conceptualism.
In her seminal essay “Grids”, Rosalind Krauss focuses on the ubiquity and purpose of the grid in modern art. Originally published in October in 1979, Krauss pinpoints the grid as the emblem of modernist ambition, stating that, “the grid announces, among other things, modern art’s will to silence, its hostility to literature, to narrative, to discourse.”[2] Throughout the first part of the text Krauss stresses the extent to which the grid represents an obstacle and thus a rupture between visual art and language and as such has impeded artistic development.[3] She goes on to claim that the grid is that which art becomes when it turns its back to nature, fostering work that is “antinatural, antimimetic, antireal.”[4]
Continuing her argument, Krauss traces the turbulent relationship between the sacred, or spiritual, and the secular, or material, in pictorial representation. She states that by the end of the nineteenth century, and undoubtedly within the twentieth century, uttering “art” and “spirit” in the same sentence proved embarrassing. Thus the lure of the grid lies in its power to mask such shame by allowing reflection on the spiritual through the material: “[the grid] makes us able to think we are dealing with materialism (or sometimes science, or logic) while at the same time it provides us with a release into belief (or illusion, or fiction).”[5]
The flattening, geometricizing and organizational properties of the grid seem to facilitate an impersonal projection of the world in which spiritual qualities are repressed. Yet in moving away from the modernist tradition contemporary artists have renovated the grid into an instrument for examining the relationship between people and space. In the form of a map, blueprint or floor plan, the grid introduces a human aspect into the discourse. Kathryn Brown’s “The Artist as Urban Geographer” (2010) analyses this contemporary twist, suggesting that in the twenty-first century artists,"transform the pictorial and interpretive conventions associated with the grid and suggest ways in which its figurative space can make visible diverse relations between individuals, communities, and the city. As a result the grid becomes a dynamic structure capable of communicating a variety of subjective experiences of the urban environment."[6]The map is therefore a malleable grid that, although utilitarian in nature, offers an abundance of metaphors for the human condition.
Early modernism witnessed the inclusion of maps in works by Giorgio De Chirico, Salvador Dali and Joaquin Torres Garcia. From the 1960s onwards the use of the map in art rose significantly, prompting artists such as Jasper Johns, Robert Smithson, Nancy Graves, Jan Dibbets, Alighiero e Boetti and Guy Debord to incorporate cartographical elements into their practice, either as formal prototypes or tools for commenting on history, boundaries and the psyche. Such was the pervasiveness of the structure that in 1994 both Robert Storr and Frances Colpitt unknowingly organised exhibitions titled Mapping that addressed the role of maps in art.
The explosion of maps as subject matter has perhaps been due to their proliferation in twentieth-century life. For artist and cartographer Denis Wood, “our society is more map-immersed than any that has previously existed, contemporary map artists have grown up bathed in maps to an unprecedented degree”.[7]
Similar to the grid, the model has evolved beyond its formal purpose in art. Typically associated with architecture, a model constitutes a representation of an object on a smaller scale and is used as a secondary tool for the study of the subject it represents. Today, artists are investigating the primary function of the model as a way of constructing reality. Olafur Eliasson has expressed an interest in this shift, noting that “we no longer progress from model to reality, but from model to model while acknowledging that both models are, in fact, real […] models have become co-producers of reality.”[8]
Floor plans, blueprints and maps are composed of elements that belong to the grid and model. The grid and the model create fictional or alternative spaces that promote reflexion on the human experience, yet such mechanisms for creating space are not solely reserved for the visual arts. In literature the grid and the model come together in the room, house or city. Writers use such structures to immerse the reader in a setting that, while equipped with psychosocial implications, can be manipulated to highlight different aspects of human life. Edgar Allan Poe, Franz Kafka, Federico Garcia Lorca, Doris Lessing and Georges Perec have successfully adopted this approach over the past two centuries. However, no literary tradition is as absorbed by this motif as that of Argentina.
III. Presenting Space
Argentine painter Guillermo Kuitca is a keen observer of the human condition. The grid and the model stand at the crux of his oeuvre. For Olga M. Viso, his paintings of "house plans, city maps, genealogical charts, prison cells, cemetery plots, and theatres blur the distinction between absence and presence, the past and present, fiction and reality, and consider with great subtlety and power the volatile places where the exceedingly private and intensely public nature of human existence clash and converge.[9]
Kuitca’s works proffer a narrative of the systems and mechanisms that govern, describe and organise the physical world. Although largely devoid of the human figure his paintings touch on the themes of memory, exile and isolation by presenting the places where social interactions occur.
Born in Buenos Aires in 1961, Kuitca cites Francis Bacon, Andy Warhol and Jorge Luis Borges as formative influences.[10] Yet no one made a stronger impact on his artistic development than Pina Bausch. Kuitca first encountered the German choreographer at the age of 19 in a production of Café Muller in Buenos Aires.[11] The young artist was so captivated by Bausch’s style of direction, which encouraged dancers to move awkwardly and repetitively as a way of insinuating a variety of emotional states, that he moved to Germany to better observe her methods.[12] What struck Kuitca was Bausch’s notion that for dance walking was sufficient. In an interview with Hans-Michael Herzog, he recounts this “as a kind of minimalist thinking that I understood profoundly. Sometimes walking is enough. To see that on stage […] made me ask myself: How can I make my work from that point of view?”[13] Kuitca’s paintings subsequently developed strong conceptual characteristics that, like Bausch’s pieces, deconstruct human emotion.
In addition to thematic implications, the influences of the theatre and the opera give Kuitca’s works a stage-like appearance. According to critic Jerry Saltz, what seem like empty stage sets produce in the viewer the feeling of having walked in on a scene but having just missed the action, which enhances the melancholic tone of the work.[14]
Art writers and audience members are quick to draw connections between binary themes in Kuitca’s works about Argentina’s political history, such as absence and presence or private and public. Since Kuitca lived and produced work in Argentina during the military dictatorship such associations are easily made. Argentina’s military dictatorship lasted from 1976 to 1984 during a period marked by political oppression, torture and state-sponsored terrorism that saw the disappearance of roughly 30,000 Argentines. Although Kuitca claims that his family was not directly affected by the dictatorship, he asserts that events of the time influenced his work, although he rejects the title of ‘political artist’.[15]
The flattening, geometricizing and organizational properties of the grid seem to facilitate an impersonal projection of the world in which spiritual qualities are repressed. Yet in moving away from the modernist tradition contemporary artists have renovated the grid into an instrument for examining the relationship between people and space. In the form of a map, blueprint or floor plan, the grid introduces a human aspect into the discourse. Kathryn Brown’s “The Artist as Urban Geographer” (2010) analyses this contemporary twist, suggesting that in the twenty-first century artists,"transform the pictorial and interpretive conventions associated with the grid and suggest ways in which its figurative space can make visible diverse relations between individuals, communities, and the city. As a result the grid becomes a dynamic structure capable of communicating a variety of subjective experiences of the urban environment."[6]The map is therefore a malleable grid that, although utilitarian in nature, offers an abundance of metaphors for the human condition.
Early modernism witnessed the inclusion of maps in works by Giorgio De Chirico, Salvador Dali and Joaquin Torres Garcia. From the 1960s onwards the use of the map in art rose significantly, prompting artists such as Jasper Johns, Robert Smithson, Nancy Graves, Jan Dibbets, Alighiero e Boetti and Guy Debord to incorporate cartographical elements into their practice, either as formal prototypes or tools for commenting on history, boundaries and the psyche. Such was the pervasiveness of the structure that in 1994 both Robert Storr and Frances Colpitt unknowingly organised exhibitions titled Mapping that addressed the role of maps in art.
The explosion of maps as subject matter has perhaps been due to their proliferation in twentieth-century life. For artist and cartographer Denis Wood, “our society is more map-immersed than any that has previously existed, contemporary map artists have grown up bathed in maps to an unprecedented degree”.[7]
Similar to the grid, the model has evolved beyond its formal purpose in art. Typically associated with architecture, a model constitutes a representation of an object on a smaller scale and is used as a secondary tool for the study of the subject it represents. Today, artists are investigating the primary function of the model as a way of constructing reality. Olafur Eliasson has expressed an interest in this shift, noting that “we no longer progress from model to reality, but from model to model while acknowledging that both models are, in fact, real […] models have become co-producers of reality.”[8]
Floor plans, blueprints and maps are composed of elements that belong to the grid and model. The grid and the model create fictional or alternative spaces that promote reflexion on the human experience, yet such mechanisms for creating space are not solely reserved for the visual arts. In literature the grid and the model come together in the room, house or city. Writers use such structures to immerse the reader in a setting that, while equipped with psychosocial implications, can be manipulated to highlight different aspects of human life. Edgar Allan Poe, Franz Kafka, Federico Garcia Lorca, Doris Lessing and Georges Perec have successfully adopted this approach over the past two centuries. However, no literary tradition is as absorbed by this motif as that of Argentina.
III. Presenting Space
Argentine painter Guillermo Kuitca is a keen observer of the human condition. The grid and the model stand at the crux of his oeuvre. For Olga M. Viso, his paintings of "house plans, city maps, genealogical charts, prison cells, cemetery plots, and theatres blur the distinction between absence and presence, the past and present, fiction and reality, and consider with great subtlety and power the volatile places where the exceedingly private and intensely public nature of human existence clash and converge.[9]
Kuitca’s works proffer a narrative of the systems and mechanisms that govern, describe and organise the physical world. Although largely devoid of the human figure his paintings touch on the themes of memory, exile and isolation by presenting the places where social interactions occur.
Born in Buenos Aires in 1961, Kuitca cites Francis Bacon, Andy Warhol and Jorge Luis Borges as formative influences.[10] Yet no one made a stronger impact on his artistic development than Pina Bausch. Kuitca first encountered the German choreographer at the age of 19 in a production of Café Muller in Buenos Aires.[11] The young artist was so captivated by Bausch’s style of direction, which encouraged dancers to move awkwardly and repetitively as a way of insinuating a variety of emotional states, that he moved to Germany to better observe her methods.[12] What struck Kuitca was Bausch’s notion that for dance walking was sufficient. In an interview with Hans-Michael Herzog, he recounts this “as a kind of minimalist thinking that I understood profoundly. Sometimes walking is enough. To see that on stage […] made me ask myself: How can I make my work from that point of view?”[13] Kuitca’s paintings subsequently developed strong conceptual characteristics that, like Bausch’s pieces, deconstruct human emotion.
In addition to thematic implications, the influences of the theatre and the opera give Kuitca’s works a stage-like appearance. According to critic Jerry Saltz, what seem like empty stage sets produce in the viewer the feeling of having walked in on a scene but having just missed the action, which enhances the melancholic tone of the work.[14]
Art writers and audience members are quick to draw connections between binary themes in Kuitca’s works about Argentina’s political history, such as absence and presence or private and public. Since Kuitca lived and produced work in Argentina during the military dictatorship such associations are easily made. Argentina’s military dictatorship lasted from 1976 to 1984 during a period marked by political oppression, torture and state-sponsored terrorism that saw the disappearance of roughly 30,000 Argentines. Although Kuitca claims that his family was not directly affected by the dictatorship, he asserts that events of the time influenced his work, although he rejects the title of ‘political artist’.[15]
The floor plan makes its first appearance in Kuitca’s work in 1987. Unlike the floor plans that would follow, this early example displays the remnants of human life. In the foreground the blueprint of the bathroom is discernable, while on the right a stovetop and dining table can be distinguished. While the space depicted has not been completely abstracted, the sense of distancing evident in later works is already present here. Crown of Thorns (1989) exemplifies the standard apartment floor plan of the on-going series. The space depicted is completely devoid of human figures and anything subjective or personal that might imply domesticity. The space is completely closed and the lines that separate the inner and outer spaces appear to be comprised of thorns. The painting suggests isolation, suffering and pain. It alludes to the separate lives we lead, the public and the private, and the mental architecture we build in order to seclude ourselves. In House Plan with Tear Drops (1989) Kuitca attempts to humanise the vacant space, generating a more powerful evocation of human pain while simultaneously activating the space; perhaps a presence has been left in the space after its human counterpart has departed as a sort of embodiment of the experiences that have occurred in the space. A more recent floor plan, Planta con juego de pelotas (2000), conveys this same notion. Here the grid is completely black, making it more difficult to distinguish as an apartment plan than in the aforementioned works. The title translates to “Floor plan with game of balls”, which suggests that the spots on the model have been made by coating a ball in pigment and bouncing it off the linen. If so, then Planta con juego de pelotas shares a strong connection with Abstract Expressionism.
The floor plans can be interpreted as representing a single person or a single family unit and thus present intimate and personal spaces. Their aerial viewpoint relates to the idea of invasion or surveillance.[16] Accordingly, the artist places the viewer in an intrusive, voyeuristic position from which they invade the familiar space. Simultaneously, this gives the viewer the opportunity to reflect on their own personal spaces, where experiences are created and personal dramas unfold. Kuitca’s geometric spaces prompt introspective meditation while serving as stage sets for personal and social narratives.
Stepping further back from personal space, Kuitca introduces the map into his oeuvre. Despite dealing with similar themes as those tackled in the floor plans, the maps address a larger social unit. Kuitca’s maps are often the opposite of navigational devises, as he explains, “for me the map was an instrument for getting lost, not for finding myself. The map interested me not to identify, to know where you are, but on the contrary: to know where you are not.”[17] Kuitca further stresses the anti-navigational purpose of his maps by changing, repeating or misspelling the names of cities and streets.[18] For MALBA’s[19] head curator, Marcelo Pacheco, this navigational subversion signifies a liberation from socio-political restraints and a means for countering oppressive taxonomies.[20] Critic and art historian Gayle Clemans believes these features to be symbols of mankind’s inevitable dislocation from reality.[21] In addition to undermining place names, Kuitca often places markers for cities in arbitrary locations of no importance in the form of labels or buttons; in fact, they are possibly not cities at all. For Kuitca, these principles and characteristics endow his maps with the qualities of physical and mental labyrinths.
Kuitca’s appropriation of maps is noticeably more flexible than his use of floor plans. In Town of Thorns (1991) a deep-brown background lies underneath a grid of thorns laid out on an intimate scale. The names of the streets suggest a map of Britain, but as the architect of the map, and therefore architect of the city, Kuitca may have simply named the streets as he pleased. In this map the artist reuses the religious motif of the thorns that was previously applied to the apartment plan. He thus breaks out of the secluded shelter of the floor plan and into the city, yet here he encounters the same social, political and psychological limitations. Untitled (1992) is filled with rich metaphors that similarly address the relationship between the public and the private in terms of space. Here Kuitca paints a European road map onto the surface of 20 custom-made child-size beds. The presence of the gird in the installation is double since not only is the map a grid but the beds are also organised in a grid. The mattresses suggest security and intimacy, but their grim and tattered appearance is anything but comforting. The bed is the most personal of private spaces, “It’s a life buoy: the quintessential carrier of the spirit and the flesh.”[22] The strict organisation of the said space can be interpreted as a limitation imposed by the self or by a social structure. The superimposition of a utilitarian device on the beds once again presents an internalisation of the regulations and classifications placed on the individual. A far more abstract example of the map is Everything (2004). This piece comprises four quasi-identical panels placed side-by-side in a nod to Warhol. The black background is barely visible behind thin threads and thicker accumulations of white pigment. The piece looks slightly more like a topographical map than a city grid, showing perhaps the rising and falling curves of hills and valleys. The large size of the piece adds to its sublime tonalities, which, when thought of in conjunction with the title, recall a representation of the cosmos. The piece simultaneously inspires feelings of isolation and awe, exile and community.
By presenting the mechanisms used to organise and navigate the world Kuitca questions the accuracy of such imposed spatial representations when dealing with actual people. Through the use of the grid and the model the artist creates alternative realities that make salient many of the issues that shape the human condition
IV. A Literary Tradition
As mentioned above, the properties of the grid and the model are frequently used in literature as a means for creating mental spaces in which the reader can witness a narrative unfold. As in the works of Guillermo Kuitca, fellow Argentines Julio Cortazar and Jorge Luis Borges use the motifs of the house, the map and the labyrinth not simply to create mental space but more importantly to address matters of human experience.
Cortazar and Borges both produced the bulk of their work in the decade spanning 1945 to 1955, a period marked by the right wing military populist policies of President Juan Domingo Peron. As in Kuitca’s paintings, political undertones in the works of both writers are palpable. Both also employ magical realism, a style known for its insertion of fantastical elements into quotidian settings, and thus the house and the map are frequent but wholly malleable motifs.
Cortazar’s short story House Taken Over (1946) can be read in dialogue with Kuitca’s floor plans. The reader is told of a brother and sister who inherit the large house that they grew up in and which has been in the family for years. The siblings spend the majority of their day looking after the house and engage in mundane activities, rarely leaving the confines of their home. One day they hear a muffled sound and agree that something or someone has started to take over the house, so they restrict themselves to living in smaller and smaller areas until they are eventually evicted by the presence. As in Kuitca’s plans, the notions of self-imposed isolation and entrapment are evident. Furthermore, the idea of a house as a sort of palace of memory filled with energies so powerful that it is capable of displacing its inhabitants creates a strong parallel, particularly with Planta on juego de pelotas.
IV. A Literary Tradition
As mentioned above, the properties of the grid and the model are frequently used in literature as a means for creating mental spaces in which the reader can witness a narrative unfold. As in the works of Guillermo Kuitca, fellow Argentines Julio Cortazar and Jorge Luis Borges use the motifs of the house, the map and the labyrinth not simply to create mental space but more importantly to address matters of human experience.
Cortazar and Borges both produced the bulk of their work in the decade spanning 1945 to 1955, a period marked by the right wing military populist policies of President Juan Domingo Peron. As in Kuitca’s paintings, political undertones in the works of both writers are palpable. Both also employ magical realism, a style known for its insertion of fantastical elements into quotidian settings, and thus the house and the map are frequent but wholly malleable motifs.
Cortazar’s short story House Taken Over (1946) can be read in dialogue with Kuitca’s floor plans. The reader is told of a brother and sister who inherit the large house that they grew up in and which has been in the family for years. The siblings spend the majority of their day looking after the house and engage in mundane activities, rarely leaving the confines of their home. One day they hear a muffled sound and agree that something or someone has started to take over the house, so they restrict themselves to living in smaller and smaller areas until they are eventually evicted by the presence. As in Kuitca’s plans, the notions of self-imposed isolation and entrapment are evident. Furthermore, the idea of a house as a sort of palace of memory filled with energies so powerful that it is capable of displacing its inhabitants creates a strong parallel, particularly with Planta on juego de pelotas.
The house appears consistently in the work of Borges. In The House of Asterion (1947) Borges makes use of the concept of the house to discus the labyrinth and, like Kuitca, uses the grid to create physical and mental labyrinths. The story is told from the point of view of Asterion, who is revealed to be the Cretan Minotaur, and his house is the labyrinth. As in Crown of Thorns, Asterion’s confines are neither small nor cramped, but he remains a prisoner. He is a prisoner not only of his physical surroundings but also of the fact that he is a monster, a state of being he hopes to be released from. Consistent with Kuitca’s preoccupations, from the Minotaur’s perspective he is a monster because he has been exiled and conditioned to be one; his being a monster is not part of his natural character.
Borges’ The Aleph (1945) has a connection to Kuitca’s concerns and body of work in general and is particularly resonant with the notion of the mental labyrinth. After a series of events the protagonist, named Borges, is taken to the basement of a house that will soon be demolished to see an Aleph. The Aleph is a small sphere within which everything in the universe can be seen from every angle at the same time. Once the house is destroyed the Aleph is destroyed and Borges is left questioning whether what he saw was real or not. Essentially, he struggles to find a method for representing the “everything” that he has seen because no method is objective enough. The Aleph can be interpreted as the place where imagination resides, from which inspiration is drawn and where constructs are built. Perhaps the best way to display the Aleph is though a grid or a model.
Borges’ The Aleph (1945) has a connection to Kuitca’s concerns and body of work in general and is particularly resonant with the notion of the mental labyrinth. After a series of events the protagonist, named Borges, is taken to the basement of a house that will soon be demolished to see an Aleph. The Aleph is a small sphere within which everything in the universe can be seen from every angle at the same time. Once the house is destroyed the Aleph is destroyed and Borges is left questioning whether what he saw was real or not. Essentially, he struggles to find a method for representing the “everything” that he has seen because no method is objective enough. The Aleph can be interpreted as the place where imagination resides, from which inspiration is drawn and where constructs are built. Perhaps the best way to display the Aleph is though a grid or a model.
V. Conclusion
By combining elements of the grid and the model Guillermo Kuitca, Julio Cortazar and Jorge Luis Borges explore the relationship between people and space. In an examination on the purpose of the grid, Rosalind Krauss concluded that the grid was not a story but rather a structure that allowed for the contradiction between the values of science and the values of spiritualism to remain separate and repressed.[23] Throughout the course of this essay, however, I have argued that the role of the grid, like that of the model, has evolved into a method for creating instances of meditation on the human condition that need not be repressed. Paintings by Kuitca that combine grids and models are psychologically charged works that explore the dichotomies and intersections between the public and the private, absence and presence, and fiction and reality. In literature, both Cortazar and Borges make use of the visual components of these two structures to create fantastic realities that echo Kuitca’s themes of memory, isolation and exile. As studied through the three Argentine artists, the model and the grid do not oppose literature, narrative, and discourse, but rather embolden it.
By combining elements of the grid and the model Guillermo Kuitca, Julio Cortazar and Jorge Luis Borges explore the relationship between people and space. In an examination on the purpose of the grid, Rosalind Krauss concluded that the grid was not a story but rather a structure that allowed for the contradiction between the values of science and the values of spiritualism to remain separate and repressed.[23] Throughout the course of this essay, however, I have argued that the role of the grid, like that of the model, has evolved into a method for creating instances of meditation on the human condition that need not be repressed. Paintings by Kuitca that combine grids and models are psychologically charged works that explore the dichotomies and intersections between the public and the private, absence and presence, and fiction and reality. In literature, both Cortazar and Borges make use of the visual components of these two structures to create fantastic realities that echo Kuitca’s themes of memory, isolation and exile. As studied through the three Argentine artists, the model and the grid do not oppose literature, narrative, and discourse, but rather embolden it.
1] Magdalena Dabrowski, “Geometric Abstraction. Heilburn Timeline of Art History,” The Metropolitan Museum of Art, accessed 22 April 2014, http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/geab/hd_geab.htm.
[2] Rosalind Krauss, “Grids,” October 9 (Summer, 1979): 50, accessed 16 April, 2014, http://www.jstor.org/stable/778321.
[3] Krauss cites Piet Mondrian’s career as an example.
[4] Krauss, “Grids,” 50.
[5] Krauss, “Grids,” 54.
[6] Kathryn Brown, “The Artist as Urban Geographer: Mark Bradford and Julie Mehretu,” American Art 24, no. 3 (2010).
[7] Denis Wood, “Map Art,” Cartographic Perspectives 53 (2006): 7.
[8] Olafur Eliasson, “Models are Real,” in Models: 306090 Books, Volume II, eds. Emily Abruzzo, Eric Ellingsen and Jonathan D, Solomon (New York, NY: 306090, Inc., 2007).
[9] Olga M. Viso, “Guillermo Kuitca: Connection and Contradiction,” in Distemper: Dissonant Themes in the Art of the 1990s, eds. Neal Benezra and Olga M. Viso (Washington, DC: Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Smithsonian Institution: 1996), 66.
[10] “Hans-Michael Herzog in Conversation with Guillermo Kuitca,” in Das Leid ven der Erde: Guillermo Kuitca November 25, 2006 – March 18, 2007, Daros Exhibitions, Zurich (Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz Publishing, 2006).
[11] Olga M. Viso, “Resistant Painting,” in Guillermo Kuitca: Everything, Paintings and works on paper, 1980-2008, ed. Douglass Dreishpoon (New York, NY: Scala Publishers Ltd., 2009), 69.
[12] Ibid.
[13] “Hans-Michael Herzog in Conversation with Guillermo Kuitca.”
[14] Jerry Saltz, “Guillermo Kuitca’s Human Touch,” in A Book Based on Guillermo Kuitca (Amsterdam: Contemporary Art Foundation, 1993), 132.
[15] “Hans-Michael Herzog in Conversation with Guillermo Kuitca.”
[16] Olga M. Viso, “Guillermo Kuitca: Connection and Contradiction,” in Distemper: Dissonant Themes in the Art of the 1990s, eds. Neal Benezra and Olga M. Viso (Washington, DC: Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Smithsonian Institution, 1996), 68.
[17] “Hans-Michael Herzog in Conversation with Guillermo Kuitca.”
[18] Gayle Clemans, “Guillermo Kuitca: Maps of Presence and Absence,” in The Map as Art: Contemporary Artists Explore Cartography (New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2009), 186.
[19] MALBA: The Latin American Art Museum of Buenos Aires.
[20] Pacheco, Marcelo E., “Guillermo Kuitca: A Painter’s Inventory,” in A Book Based on Guillermo Kuitca (Amsterdam: Contemporary Art Foundation, 1993), 192.
[21] Gayle Clemans, “Guillermo Kuitca: Maps of Presence and Absence,” in The Map as Art: Contemporary Artists Explore Cartography (New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2009), 188.
[22] Jerry Saltz, “Guillermo Kuitca’s Human Touch,” 133.
[23] Krauss, “Grids,” 55.
[2] Rosalind Krauss, “Grids,” October 9 (Summer, 1979): 50, accessed 16 April, 2014, http://www.jstor.org/stable/778321.
[3] Krauss cites Piet Mondrian’s career as an example.
[4] Krauss, “Grids,” 50.
[5] Krauss, “Grids,” 54.
[6] Kathryn Brown, “The Artist as Urban Geographer: Mark Bradford and Julie Mehretu,” American Art 24, no. 3 (2010).
[7] Denis Wood, “Map Art,” Cartographic Perspectives 53 (2006): 7.
[8] Olafur Eliasson, “Models are Real,” in Models: 306090 Books, Volume II, eds. Emily Abruzzo, Eric Ellingsen and Jonathan D, Solomon (New York, NY: 306090, Inc., 2007).
[9] Olga M. Viso, “Guillermo Kuitca: Connection and Contradiction,” in Distemper: Dissonant Themes in the Art of the 1990s, eds. Neal Benezra and Olga M. Viso (Washington, DC: Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Smithsonian Institution: 1996), 66.
[10] “Hans-Michael Herzog in Conversation with Guillermo Kuitca,” in Das Leid ven der Erde: Guillermo Kuitca November 25, 2006 – March 18, 2007, Daros Exhibitions, Zurich (Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz Publishing, 2006).
[11] Olga M. Viso, “Resistant Painting,” in Guillermo Kuitca: Everything, Paintings and works on paper, 1980-2008, ed. Douglass Dreishpoon (New York, NY: Scala Publishers Ltd., 2009), 69.
[12] Ibid.
[13] “Hans-Michael Herzog in Conversation with Guillermo Kuitca.”
[14] Jerry Saltz, “Guillermo Kuitca’s Human Touch,” in A Book Based on Guillermo Kuitca (Amsterdam: Contemporary Art Foundation, 1993), 132.
[15] “Hans-Michael Herzog in Conversation with Guillermo Kuitca.”
[16] Olga M. Viso, “Guillermo Kuitca: Connection and Contradiction,” in Distemper: Dissonant Themes in the Art of the 1990s, eds. Neal Benezra and Olga M. Viso (Washington, DC: Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Smithsonian Institution, 1996), 68.
[17] “Hans-Michael Herzog in Conversation with Guillermo Kuitca.”
[18] Gayle Clemans, “Guillermo Kuitca: Maps of Presence and Absence,” in The Map as Art: Contemporary Artists Explore Cartography (New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2009), 186.
[19] MALBA: The Latin American Art Museum of Buenos Aires.
[20] Pacheco, Marcelo E., “Guillermo Kuitca: A Painter’s Inventory,” in A Book Based on Guillermo Kuitca (Amsterdam: Contemporary Art Foundation, 1993), 192.
[21] Gayle Clemans, “Guillermo Kuitca: Maps of Presence and Absence,” in The Map as Art: Contemporary Artists Explore Cartography (New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2009), 188.
[22] Jerry Saltz, “Guillermo Kuitca’s Human Touch,” 133.
[23] Krauss, “Grids,” 55.
Bibliography
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Brown, Kathryn. “The Artist as Urban Geographer: Mark Bradford and Julie Mehretu.” American Art 24, no. 3 (2010): 100-13.
Burns, Charlotte. “Kuitca Brings a Bit of Drama to Miami.” The Art Newspaper, 4 December 2009. Accessed 16 April 2014. http://www.theartnewspaper.com/articles/Kuitca%20brings%20a%20bit%20%20of%20drama%20to%20Miami/19824.
Clemans, Gayle. “Guillermo Kuitca: Maps of Presence and Absence.” In The Map as Art: Contemporary Artists Explore Cartography, 186-91. New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2009.
Cortazar, Julio. “Casa Tomada.” Originally published in Los Anales de Buenos Aires, 1946. Accessed 17 April 2014. http://www.ciudadseva.com/textos/cuentos/esp/cortazar/casa_tomada.htm
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“De Stijl.” Tate Online Resources. Accessed 18 April 2014. http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/d/de-stijl?entryId=82.
Denker, Susan A. “De Stijl: 1917-1931, Visions of Utopia.” Art Journal 42 no. 3 (Autumn, 1982): 242-46. Accessed 22 April 2014. http://www.jstor.org/stable/776588.
Dreishpoon, Douglas, ed. Guillermo Kuitca: Everything, Paintings and works on paper, 1980-2008. New York, NY: Scala Publishers Ltd., 2009.
Duville, Matias. “Guillermo Kuitca.” Translated by Margaret Carson. Bomb no. 106 (Winter 2009): 50-57.
Eliasson, Olafur. “Models are Real.” In Models: 306090 Books, Volume II, edited by Emily Abruzzo, Eric Ellingsen and Jonathan D, Solomon, 18-25. New York, NY: 306090, Inc., 2007.
Georgievska-Shine, Aneta. “GUILLERMO KUITCA.” Artus no. 31 (2011): 24-27.
“Hans-Michael Herzog in Conversation with Guillermo Kuitca.” In Das Leid ven der Erde: Guillermo Kuitca November 25, 2006 – March 18, 2007. Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz Publishing, 2006.
Harmon, Katherine. You Are Here: Personal Geographies and Other Maps of the Imagination. New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2004.
Harmon, Katherine and Gayle Clemans. The Map as Art: Contemporary Artists Explore Cartography. New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2009.
Jimenez, Carlos. “Guillermo Kuitca: Histories of Painting.” Art Nexus 6, no. 64 (2007): 92-93.
Johnson, Grant. “Building Silence: Guillermo Kuitca.” Art Papers 34, no. 6 (2010): 32-37. Accessed 15 April 2014. http://searcchebsohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=asu&AN=505367995&site=ehost-live.
Krauss, Rosalind. “Grids.” October 9 (Summer, 1979): 50-64. Accessed 16 April, 2014. http://www.jstor.org/stable/778321.
Ollman, Leah. “The World According to Kuitca.” Art in America 97, no. 11 (2009): 122-27.
Pacheco, Marcelo E. “Guillermo Kuitca: A Painter’s Inventory.” In A Book Based on Guillermo Kuitca, 162-200. Amsterdam: Contemporary Art Foundation, 1993.
Parkinson Zamora, Lois and Wendy B. Faris, eds. Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. 5th edition. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2005.
Pearce, Martin. “Guillermo Kuitca.” Border Crossing 29, no. 3 (2010): 141-43. Accessed 15 April 2014. http://search.proquest.com/docview/840372535?accountid=13958.
Perkins, Chris. “Cartography: Mapping Theory.” Progress in Human Geography 27, no. 3 (2003): 341-51. Accessed 23 April 2014. http://ezproxy.sothebysinstitute.com:2195/docview/230738575.
Rave, Maria Eugenia B. Magical Realism and Latin America. MA Dissertation, University of Maine, 2003. Accessed 24 April 2014. https://www.library.umaine.edu/theses/pdf/RaveMEB2003.pdf
Saltz, Jerry. “Guillermo Kuitca’s Human Touch.” In A Book Based on Guillermo Kuitca, 123-43. Amsterdam: Contemporary Art Foundation, 1993.
Storr, Robert. “All About Guillermo Kuitca.” Modern Painters 22, no. 5 (2010): 64-69. Accessed 14 April 2014. http://ezproxy.sothebysinstitute.com:2323/ehost/delivery?sid=22818ac6=976b-4498-80d5-e1006af553a6%40sessionmgr4005&vid=5&hid=4209
Tupitsyn, Margarita. “The Gird as a Checkpoint of Modernity.” Tate Papers 12 (2009). Accessed 18 April 2014. http://www.tate.org.uk/research/publications/tate-papers/grid-checkpoint-modernity.
Viso, Olga M. “Guillermo Kuitca: Connection and Contra.diction” In Distemper: Dissonant Themes in the Art of the 1990s, edited by Neal Benezra and Olga M. Viso, 66-77. Washington, DC: Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Smithsonian Institution, 1996.
Walker Art Center. “Opening-Day Artist Talk: Guillermo Kuitca.” Accessed 20 April 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7Nmkt10mCw
Wood, Denis. “Map Art.” Cartographic Perspectives 53 (2006): 5-14.
Wright, Karen. “Guillermo Kuitca: Wagner from Mars.” Modern Painters (April 2005): 66-71.
Belcove, Julie L. “Guillermo Kuitca.” W 38, no. 11 (2009). Accessed 15 April 2014. http://search.proquest.com/docview/89302243?accountid=13958.
Borges, Jorge Luis. “Del rigor en la ciencia.” Originally published in Los Anales de Buenos Aires, 1946. Accessed 18 April 2014. http://www.sccs.swarthmore.edu/users/08/bblonder/phys120/docs/borges.pdf.
Borges, Jorge Luis. “El Aleph.” Originally published in El Alph, 1949. Accessed 18 April 2014. http://www.ciudadseva.com/textos/cuentos/esp/borges/el_aleph.htm.
Borges, Jorge Luis. “La casa de Asterion.” Originally published in Los Anales de Buenos Aires, 1947. Accessed 18 April 2014. http://www.ciudadseva.com/textos/cuentos/esp/borges/la_casa_de_asterion.htm.
Brown, Kathryn. “The Artist as Urban Geographer: Mark Bradford and Julie Mehretu.” American Art 24, no. 3 (2010): 100-13.
Burns, Charlotte. “Kuitca Brings a Bit of Drama to Miami.” The Art Newspaper, 4 December 2009. Accessed 16 April 2014. http://www.theartnewspaper.com/articles/Kuitca%20brings%20a%20bit%20%20of%20drama%20to%20Miami/19824.
Clemans, Gayle. “Guillermo Kuitca: Maps of Presence and Absence.” In The Map as Art: Contemporary Artists Explore Cartography, 186-91. New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2009.
Cortazar, Julio. “Casa Tomada.” Originally published in Los Anales de Buenos Aires, 1946. Accessed 17 April 2014. http://www.ciudadseva.com/textos/cuentos/esp/cortazar/casa_tomada.htm
Dabrowski, Magdalena. “Geometric Abstraction. Heilburn Timeline of Art History.” The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Accessed 22 April 2014. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/geab/hd_geab.htm.
“De Stijl.” Tate Online Resources. Accessed 18 April 2014. http://www.tate.org.uk/learn/online-resources/glossary/d/de-stijl?entryId=82.
Denker, Susan A. “De Stijl: 1917-1931, Visions of Utopia.” Art Journal 42 no. 3 (Autumn, 1982): 242-46. Accessed 22 April 2014. http://www.jstor.org/stable/776588.
Dreishpoon, Douglas, ed. Guillermo Kuitca: Everything, Paintings and works on paper, 1980-2008. New York, NY: Scala Publishers Ltd., 2009.
Duville, Matias. “Guillermo Kuitca.” Translated by Margaret Carson. Bomb no. 106 (Winter 2009): 50-57.
Eliasson, Olafur. “Models are Real.” In Models: 306090 Books, Volume II, edited by Emily Abruzzo, Eric Ellingsen and Jonathan D, Solomon, 18-25. New York, NY: 306090, Inc., 2007.
Georgievska-Shine, Aneta. “GUILLERMO KUITCA.” Artus no. 31 (2011): 24-27.
“Hans-Michael Herzog in Conversation with Guillermo Kuitca.” In Das Leid ven der Erde: Guillermo Kuitca November 25, 2006 – March 18, 2007. Ostfildern: Hatje Cantz Publishing, 2006.
Harmon, Katherine. You Are Here: Personal Geographies and Other Maps of the Imagination. New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2004.
Harmon, Katherine and Gayle Clemans. The Map as Art: Contemporary Artists Explore Cartography. New York, NY: Princeton Architectural Press, 2009.
Jimenez, Carlos. “Guillermo Kuitca: Histories of Painting.” Art Nexus 6, no. 64 (2007): 92-93.
Johnson, Grant. “Building Silence: Guillermo Kuitca.” Art Papers 34, no. 6 (2010): 32-37. Accessed 15 April 2014. http://searcchebsohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=asu&AN=505367995&site=ehost-live.
Krauss, Rosalind. “Grids.” October 9 (Summer, 1979): 50-64. Accessed 16 April, 2014. http://www.jstor.org/stable/778321.
Ollman, Leah. “The World According to Kuitca.” Art in America 97, no. 11 (2009): 122-27.
Pacheco, Marcelo E. “Guillermo Kuitca: A Painter’s Inventory.” In A Book Based on Guillermo Kuitca, 162-200. Amsterdam: Contemporary Art Foundation, 1993.
Parkinson Zamora, Lois and Wendy B. Faris, eds. Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community. 5th edition. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2005.
Pearce, Martin. “Guillermo Kuitca.” Border Crossing 29, no. 3 (2010): 141-43. Accessed 15 April 2014. http://search.proquest.com/docview/840372535?accountid=13958.
Perkins, Chris. “Cartography: Mapping Theory.” Progress in Human Geography 27, no. 3 (2003): 341-51. Accessed 23 April 2014. http://ezproxy.sothebysinstitute.com:2195/docview/230738575.
Rave, Maria Eugenia B. Magical Realism and Latin America. MA Dissertation, University of Maine, 2003. Accessed 24 April 2014. https://www.library.umaine.edu/theses/pdf/RaveMEB2003.pdf
Saltz, Jerry. “Guillermo Kuitca’s Human Touch.” In A Book Based on Guillermo Kuitca, 123-43. Amsterdam: Contemporary Art Foundation, 1993.
Storr, Robert. “All About Guillermo Kuitca.” Modern Painters 22, no. 5 (2010): 64-69. Accessed 14 April 2014. http://ezproxy.sothebysinstitute.com:2323/ehost/delivery?sid=22818ac6=976b-4498-80d5-e1006af553a6%40sessionmgr4005&vid=5&hid=4209
Tupitsyn, Margarita. “The Gird as a Checkpoint of Modernity.” Tate Papers 12 (2009). Accessed 18 April 2014. http://www.tate.org.uk/research/publications/tate-papers/grid-checkpoint-modernity.
Viso, Olga M. “Guillermo Kuitca: Connection and Contra.diction” In Distemper: Dissonant Themes in the Art of the 1990s, edited by Neal Benezra and Olga M. Viso, 66-77. Washington, DC: Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Smithsonian Institution, 1996.
Walker Art Center. “Opening-Day Artist Talk: Guillermo Kuitca.” Accessed 20 April 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z7Nmkt10mCw
Wood, Denis. “Map Art.” Cartographic Perspectives 53 (2006): 5-14.
Wright, Karen. “Guillermo Kuitca: Wagner from Mars.” Modern Painters (April 2005): 66-71.