Immigration in the Visual Art of Nicario Jiménez Quispe

Michael J LaRosa author Carol Damian author Steve Stein author

Format:Hardback

Publisher:Rowman & Littlefield

Published:15th Aug '19

Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back

Immigration in the Visual Art of Nicario Jiménez Quispe cover

Art meets today’s political debate over immigration in this beautifully illustrated exploration of Nicario Jiménez Quispe’s retablos. This beautifully illustrated full-color book offers a unique depiction of the current immigration debate through the lens of renowned Peruvian artist Nicario Jiménez Quispe, a recent immigrant to the United States. An internationally recognized maker of retablos, Jiménez has begun creating work that powerfully encapsulates the struggles, possibilities, and tragedies of immigration from the Global South to North America. A decorative box with figures in the interior, a retablo traditionally was used to pay homage to certain saints in Peru. In Spain, they were used as portable altars for itinerant priests who carried them to perform mass in remote areas. In the Andes, the retablo became a sort of magical-religious box designed to increase fertility among animals that served as a means of exchange in a cash-free, rural environment. The authors, leading historians of Latin America, contextualize Jiménez’s compelling art, to offer creative new insights on the bitter immigration disputes that are dividing our nation.

The authors of this insightful book offer an original entry into the current immigration debate through the eyes and work of the renowned Peruvian artist/sculptor Nicario Jiménez Quispe. The images of Jiménez’s retablos offer an innovative way of capturing the suffering of the displaced. This book is an inimitable contribution to the debate. -- Frank O. Mora, Florida International University
The Peruvian-born artist Nicario Jiménez is internationally recognized for his extraordinary, highly detailed retablos that address personal, traditional, religious, social, historical, and political events. This volume celebrates the art form by focusing on Jiménez’s immigration retablos; from the harrowing scenes along the Mexican-US border to an emphasis on the accomplishments of immigrants once settled in the United States. Jiménez’s art reminds viewers of the humanity of the demonized individuals escaping violence back home in hopes of securing a better future for themselves and their families. -- Marina Pacini, Chief Curator of the Memphis Brooks Museum of Art
The authors of this compelling work use Nicario Jiménez’s art as visual testimonies of migration policies in the Trump era. Jiménez himself has been in continuous movement, locating himself in Ayacucho, Lima, and the rest of the world. Through his retablos, he vividly portrays what migration, uprooting, and displacement mean to the person who leaves and arrives to a new place of residency—he shows the violence conveyed, the lived experiences, the hope. -- María Eugenia Ulfe, Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú

ISBN: 9781538128527

Dimensions: 211mm x 209mm x 17mm

Weight: 526g

144 pages