Latin American Neo-Baroque

"Going both forward and backward in time, Pablo Baler masterfully practices a historiography based on mutuality between the earlier historical baroque and the twentieth-century that is both based on it and illuminates it anew. Replete with detailed readings, this book makes its theoretical claims concrete and its analyses theoretically relevant. Both baroque moments come to life." (Mieke Bal, Professor, Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands and author of "Quoting Caravaggio") "Baler creates a new vocabulary in Art Criticism. Aesthetics at its queerest! An opportune translation of an essential book." (Nestor Diaz de Villegas, author of "Palavras a tribo/Palabras a la tribu and Sade's Way") "With Latin American Neo-Baroque: Senses of Distortion Baler contributes a view of soaring theoretical originality and expansive poetic range to the constantly renewed problematic of the appropriations of the Spanish baroque in Latin America." (David William Foster, Regents' Professor of Spanish, Arizona State University, USA) "Baler's Latin American Neo-Baroque should be put in the company of such books like Claude Gilbert Dubois' Le Manierisme. The scope of its theoretical approaches, its rigorous yet enjoyable style, and the innovative nature of his ideas, will make this book an essential reading for anyone interested in the field. For English language readers, there will be no better introduction for what it really means the Baroque style these days." (Marcelo Pellegrini, Associate Professor, University of Madison, Wisconsin, USA, author of "La ficcion suprema: Gonzalo Rojas y el viaje a los comienzos")

PabloBaler studies the ruptures and continuities linking the de-centered dynamics of the 17^thcentury to the logic of instability that permeates 20^th century visual and literary production in Latin America.

Pablo Baler studies the ruptures and continuities linking the de-centered dynamics of the 17^thcentury to the logic of instability that permeates 20^th century visual and literary production in Latin America. Bringing philosophy, literary interpretation, art criticism, and a poetic approach to the history of ideas, Baler offers a new perspective from which to understand the uncanny phenomenon of baroque distortion. This interdisciplinary inquiry not only leads to a more specific formulation regarding the singularity of the reappropriations of the baroque in Spanish America, but also allows for a more comprehensive assessment of its historical reach in the broader context of the representational crisis of modernity.