The invention and reinvention of Martín Chambi

Abstract

Distanced by over fifty years, Latorre and Thornton offer opposing perceptions of Martin Chambi as an artist.3 Roberto Latorre, writer for and editor of the intellectual journal Kosko, was an integral part of the cultural milieu of 1 920s Cusco, Peru, where Chambi lived and worked. His statement was part of a review of Chambi's exhibitions from around 1925. Gene Thornton, photography critic at the New York Times during the 1970s, judged Chambi from pictures exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art in 1979. Both critics reflect the aesthetic sensibilities of their time and the context in which they were writing: what are we to make of such disparate interpretations of the same photographer, including the shift from Latorre's emphasis on Chambi's landscapes to Thornton's interest in his portraits? At issue is the difference between Chambi's sense of himself as an artist during his own life, and how that sense was reshaped when Chambi was rediscovered after his death in 1973.

This is an abbreviated version of chapter four from my doctoral dissertation, Rethinking Martín Chambi, completed in 1997 at the University of New Mexico.

This is an abbreviated version of chapter four from my doctoral dissertation, Rethinking Martín Chambi, completed in 1997 at the University of New Mexico.

Notes

This is an abbreviated version of chapter four from my doctoral dissertation, Rethinking Martín Chambi, completed in 1997 at the University of New Mexico.