II.3.2 DIGITAL ARCHIVE 732314
LET US SPEAK of the Argentinean painter PETTORUTI, one of the criollo avant-gardists of the future. Let us also speak of the pros of art in our America!
We are and feel ourselves to be new; our novel goal will not admit old and foreign paths. Let us be different! We are of age and yet we still have not finished the wars for independence. Let us put an end to Europe’s moral tutelage. Let us assimilate what can be digested; let us love our teachers; but [let us admit that] our only Meccas cannot be overseas any longer. We do not have any art geniuses in our brief past to serve as guides (or even to tyrannize us). The ancient peoples of Cuzco, Palenque, and Tenochtitlán crumbled [destroying] themselves (and we are not red skins anymore). Surely, it became mandatory to break the invisible chains (the strongest of all) that in many fields still keep us as a COLONY: the great Iberian America with its ninety million inhabitants.
Let us search deeply within ourselves; let us ponder on the past and pursue our sudden cravings, but above all let us desire the making of our country. . . .
To a jaded, worn-out world, a new meaning. A higher and prolific life implies our racial mission. And it rises. A country should not be closed off, xenophobic, or stingy. [It is only worthy] as a special compartment of HUMANITY where kindred souls collaborate in the construction of a distant, future land. There, each man—already a superman—shall BE COMPLETED.
PETTORUTI—a meandering name that sounds like square wheels—was born in La Plata, of Roman blood. Mars dominates, although his astrology is tempered by Venus.
We do not wish to pigeonhole what is genuine and diverse: Pettoruti’s paintings. Always in the best of taste, they are now very far outside the letter of the Law. Even varied as they are, they are a school in and of themselves, a school of criollo roots. Made by his very will. Even in his early, compromising paintings, their arabesque (I mean, the discursive melody of the soul) fought for freedom. He usually jumped over the natural in favor of the metaphysical, often escaping the cage of reality to play in another world in the same way that music frees itself in fugues. Even his colors—reaching the HIGHEST EXPRESSION OF SPIRITUALITY—while beginning gracious dialogues, spoke beautiful nonsense. In this way he prepared himself, bolstered by what seemed inactive periods of restlessness and interior fermentation, outside the bounds of the superstition that was known as PAINTING for many centuries.
We also find some unsettling paintings, new glyphs that defy categorization: the most interesting are the products of a secret laboratory; a token of how far an artist may go when there are no hindrances to his whims. Using unbridled matter at times, then with simple means, or even with skillful extravagance, he has reached the limit of theory: each work is Law and an end in itself, a new entity and autonomous being, neither a part nor a reflection of another.
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PETTORUTI’S very complex art is and wants to be Criollo. Our very best is embedded in his works. Seeing faintly a future made him an enthusiast of our gargantuan America, from Mexico to the South Pole. Let us be happy! For new generations of creativity—and free room to fill with beauty—but let us also recognize this enormous responsibility that Fate has given us by seriously working.
Having spent many years in Europe, his assimilation clarified many problems. But he was fed by an enthusiastic faith—that of an ideal Fatherland— and a longing to freely give of its bounty while sowing in fertile soils. . . .
The potential of the new schools were not exhausted, however justifiable and contradictory to each other they were. The only important thing for the new arts is that they be invigorated by the spirit; that is, to be renewed on and on. . . .