Untitled 1964

Carlos Mérida made this untitled work in 1969, using gouache on paper. It’s an arrangement of red shapes set against a blue and black ground. Mérida was born in Guatemala, but like many Latin American artists of his generation, he spent time in Europe, and was deeply influenced by the modernist art he saw there. You can certainly see echoes of Cubism in the fragmented forms that make up this image. Yet Mérida was also very interested in Mayan art, and the modular structure of this painting evokes the repeating patterns of pre-Columbian textiles. By bringing modernism into dialogue with the traditions of indigenous art, Mérida developed a visual language that was very much his own. To understand this work better, you might want to look at examples of Mayan weaving, or at the writings of Latin American modernists who sought to create an art that was both international and rooted in local culture.