Plastic art in Latin America

Plastic art in Latin America has a rich and diverse tradition that fuses pre-Columbian indigenous influences, the Spanish colonial legacy and modern artistic currents. Some of the main manifestations of Latin American plastic art are:

Paint:
- Mexican muralism (Diego Rivera, José Clemente Orozco, David Alfaro Siqueiros) with its great murals on social and political themes.
- Naive or primitivist art (Cândido Portinari, Joaquín Torres García) with a spontaneous and naive style.
- Indigenism (Rufino Tamayo, José Sabogal) that exalts indigenous roots and cosmogony.
- Surrealism (Frida Kahlo, Wifredo Lam) with its exploration of the dreamlike and symbolic.

Sculpture:
- Pre-Columbian heritage in stone and ceramics (Maya, Inca, Olmec cultures).
- Avant-garde (Fernando González Gortázar) in metal and curved lines.
- Geometric abstraction (Edgar Negret, Jorge Oteiza).
- Neofiguration (Alejandro Colunga) mixing human and animal elements.

Graphic arts and illustration:
- Engraving and lithography (José Guadalupe Posada, Leopoldo Méndez) with political and social satires.
- Popular and folk art (crafts, decorative ceramics).
- Comic and political cartoon with pre-Hispanic roots.

Installations and object art:
- Conceptual and non-objectual art (Cildo Meireles).
- Interactive kinetic and optical works (Jesús Soto, Carlos Cruz Diez).

In general, Latin American plastic art draws on its ancestral roots, incorporates elements of the European avant-garde and creates its own languages to capture social realities, political criticism or simply the diverse cultural idiosyncrasy of the region.

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