Wikipedia:International Center for the Arts of the Americas at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston

This is the official Wikipedia page for the Documents of 20th-century Latin American and Latino Art project of the International Center for the Arts of the Americas (ICAA) at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (MFAH). The digital archive provides free access to primary sources and critical documents tracing the development of twentieth-century art in Latin America and among Latino populations in the United States. Recovered texts provide a much-needed intellectual foundation for the exhibition, collection, and interpretation of art produced along this cultural axis. Countries featured in the first phase of this multiyear project include Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Mexico, Peru, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, and Latino USA. The ICAA Digital Archive reflects the findings of this monumental digitization project and is available, free of charge, to the research and teaching community as well as to the public at large.

Please visit us at: http://icaadocs.mfah.org/icaadocs/en-us/home.aspx

What is the ICAA Documents Project? Initiated in 2002, Documents of 20th-century Latin American and Latino Art: A Digital Archive and Publications Project is a multiyear initiative dedicated to the recovery and publication of primary-source materials related to Latin American and Latino art. This initiative addresses the endemic lag in the field of Latin American/Latino art history, research, and teaching by providing access to writings by artists, artistic movements, critics, and curators from Mexico, Central and South America, the Caribbean, and the United States.

No editorial project of the scope outlined here currently exists or has ever been attempted in the field of Latin American art. Cutting across national and cultural boundaries, the project provides a much-needed intellectual foundation for the exhibition, collection, and interpretation of art produced along this cultural axis. Likewise, no other visual arts–based undertaking has sought to make use of the most cutting-edge technology to provide access to archival materials while simultaneously connecting geographically dispersed scholars and other producers of knowledge. In fact, one of the primary goals of the ICAA Documents Project is to establish an intellectual bridge between Latin artists north and south of the Rio Grande.

International Center for the Arts of the Americas (ICAA) In 2001, the MFAH established the Latin American Art Department and its research arm, the International Center for the Arts of the Americas (ICAA). Since its founding, the mission of the ICAA has been to collect, exhibit, research, and educate audiences about the diverse artistic production of Latin Americans and Latinos, which includes artists from Mexico, Central and South America, the Caribbean, and artists of Latin American descent living and working in the United States. By establishing the center, the museum sought to bring about a long-term transformation in the appreciation and understanding of Latin American and Latino visual arts in the United States and abroad. In the last decade, the ICAA has organized research-based exhibitions, pursued a dynamic publications program, and developed research and education projects that complement the MFAH’s renowned collection of Latin American art. The ICAA has organized three international symposia, published its proceedings in bilingual format, and developed widely acclaimed exhibitions, such as Inverted Utopias: Avant-Garde Art in Latin America (2004), Hélio Oiticica: The Body of Color (2006), and Carlos Cruz Diez: Color in Space and Time (2011), among others. The ICAA was initiated by the late Peter C. Marzio, Director of the MFAH from 1982 to 2010. It is headed by Mari Carmen Ramírez, Wortham Curator of Latin American Art at the MFAH and Founding Director of the ICAA. María C. Gaztambide is Director of the ICAA Documents Project.