Objective/Context:

The 1950s was a critical decade regarding discussions about the relevance of abstraction as a visual language in the arts in Colombia. The encounters and disagreements in this regard between artists, critics, and the general public are a testimony of broader aspects, such as the search for a language of its own, the need to internationalize national art, the importance of educating about and through art, and the role of art criticism. The article highlights the complexity of these discussions between different actors in the artistic milieu and shows what was at stake, according to each of them, with the adoption or not of abstract art in the Colombian capital.

Methodology:

The study is based on an exhaustive review of newspaper archival material to examine the positions of some critics and artists of the decade, who were fully involved in the debates about abstraction versus figuration.

Originality:

Although the topic of abstraction has been studied in Colombia in recent years by scholars such as Ana María Franco and Carmen María Jaramillo, this article provides a look at critical texts on abstraction rather than at the artworks themselves or the artists.

Conclusions:

The review of newspaper archival material allowed visualizing several peculiarities of the conflict between the abstract proposal and figuration in the artistic field. On the one hand, there is evidence of a generational clash between artists who represented proposals from the 1930s and 1940s, and new languages that emerged in the 1950s. On the other, the position of a group of art critics actively participating in the period allowed identifying two approaches: those who considered that both artistic trends could coexist and those who proposed an irremediable contradiction between them.

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