TY - JOUR
AU - Manzi Araneda,, Javiera
AB - Abstract This article presents the rather unknown experience of two of the most prolific graphic collectives during the military dictatorship in Chile (1973-1989): Agrupación de Plásticos Jóvenes (APJ) and Tallersol Cultural Center. The work of both groups was tackled from a perspective that focuses on the production process as a political practice, rather than only on the explicit political content of a graphic piece. The article aims to rescue the technical innovations and associative work of poster designers that overcame the restrictions and censorship imposed by the regime of Augusto Pinochet. Through an in-depth research that features archival work and interviews to members of the APJ and Tallersol, this article unravels a fragment of the history of the political posters in Chile that has been marginalized from design historical discourses, proposing at the same time a processual perspective for the study of the work of graphic activisms. Introduction Like other Latin American countries during the 1970s and 1980s, Chile underwent a coup d'etat that shaped the course of its political, social, and economic history. Augusto Pinochet led a dictatorship that lasted from 11th September 1973 to the triumph of the ‘No’ vote in the 1989 plebiscite. During this period, systematic state terrorism was resisted by political and grassroots organizations that, even under the most adverse conditions of persecution, censorship and repression, did not yield in the struggle against neoliberal reforms and the violations of human rights, or in their demands for the return of democracy. The importance achieved by graphic communication as a practice of resistance during this period has to be understood within a historical perspective, considering its leading role in the configuration of a mobilized popular imagination, forming a visual trail that has accompanied the development of social struggles driven by workers, students, communities of neighbours, and women in Chile, and Latin America generally, throughout the twentieth century. Posters have represented one of the preferred means of disseminating political messages and circulating contested images during social crisis. This article presents a critical examination of the role that graphic communication played as part of the opposition to the military dictatorship in Chile, following the history and experience of two collectives: Agrupación de Plásticos Jóvenes (Young Visual Artists Group, APJ) and the Tallersol Cultural Centre. Both groups were composed of cultural workers, university students and self-taught artists, who took their place in the resistance, emerging from a graphic ‘trench‘ that transgressed censorship and opened up instances of collective creation and active cooperation which helped to restore the social fabric. This work is based on an analysis of an unknown fragment of the history of the political poster in Chile, focusing on its immersion in the resistance against the military dictatorship. To this end, we propose a study perspective that emphasizes the graphic and social production modes that made possible the development of posters and other graphic pieces. The first section of the article addresses the theoretical and methodological framework of this perspective and its specific contribution to the history of design. The second section presents the historical context of graphic communication since the late 1970s, starting with a discussion of role during the Cold War, especially within Latin America, continuing with its local history in Chile during the 'Unidad Popular' (Popular Unity) alliance government and after the coup d’etat. In the third section, the path of both groups is characterized by tracking their particular journeys through the design, printing and distribution of posters. The article closes by offering conclusions that highlight the political power of these backroom processes as well as the need for further research. Approaching the graphic backroom In Chile, the poster as a subject of study has been approached from different angles: the semiotic1 and iconographic study of its visual appearance,2 the study of its aesthetic and technical transferences, and its content as a historical document.3 In all these cases, what prevails is an analysis of the graphic piece itself over the practices and processes that made it possible. The social, technical and creative processes that are behind the final result are usually left out or rendered invisible within the research. This omits one of the most significant areas of design, in its manner of doing macro- and micropolitics, which is the production of social bonds, technical innovations and instances of collective creation. Following Walter Benjamin, in his essay ‘The Author as Producer’, the politicization of art lies in the production of an alternative aesthetic that, by nullifying its limits and overcoming technical oppositions, broadens the repertoire of possible outcomes under the conditions provided by its context. The politicization of the practice of an artist as producer is found not only in the manifest content of their work or the messages proclaimed but also in its transformative position with respect to its production context. So when Benjamin observes that ‘Before I ask: what is a work’s position vis-à-vis the production relations of its time, I should like to ask: what is its position within them?’,4 he is not asking how a work can assert a critical position with respect to the dominant relations of production but rather how it achieves a transformation of those dominant relations within its own process of production. From this perspective, the politics of a poster should be located not only in the political identity of its slogans but in those practices that rearrange the existing social and material conditions in order not to yield to the attempts of the regime to prevent their existence. The emphasis on the possibilities of technical adaptation is found in David Edgerton’s vision, according to which ‘studying the relations between technique and society requires studying the uses of techniques’.5 Looking at the production process of the posters, the use of, or rather the modes of using, diverse techniques and technologies are crucial to understanding how technological development impacts on the speed of production, reproduction capability and visual results. However, even more relevant is the ability of producers to innovate with respect to these very techniques, in order to integrate them into their production processes as a constant exercise in transgressing the political, social and material constraints that haunted them during the dictatorship. In relation to the intersecting strategies of graphic creation and political implication, the experience of these groups is rather closer to the notion of ‘artistic activism’.6 This concept reflects a proposal made by the European avant garde movements of the interwar period, where Ana Longoni groups ‘under this definition productions and actions, often times collective ones, that use artistic resources with the will to take a stand and intervene somehow in the territory of politics’.7 More than a movement or a style, the artistic activism that emerges in Latin America in the contexts of dictatorship or state crisis refers to those ‘modes of production of aesthetic and relational forms that favour social action over traditional demands for art’s autonomy’.8 In this sense, the problem of autonomy was not the untrammelled space between the political and the social but the axis of appropriation of practices and actions following the collectives’ own criteria, removed from dependence on parties or institutions. The common axis to these practices is found in the relational and intersubjective quality at stake in their modes of doing and organizing. Indeed, ‘unlike groups of agitation and propaganda, artistic activism tends to thematize politics. But what is truly relevant is how it contributes to “producing” politics: how it constitutes the political in action’.9 The denunciation of the dominant politics (its thematization) coincides with a political exercise whereby a different society is prefigured, based on collective experiences and complicit bonds that realize the experience of another way of doing politics. ‘ In this way, graphic communication is understood not only as a technique or medium but also, in certain historical circumstances, as a socio-political practice. Thus, the field of production exceeds the graphic piece, and contemplates in turn the production of an instance of collaboration involving different actors, collective creation, and technological innovations. The emphasis in the process, that is, in the graphic backroom of production, allows us to expand the scope of study and assessment of the graphic work carried out during these years. Methodology and investigation design In order to study the work and production experience of both collectives, this research adopted an aesthetic and sociological approach, in order to obtain and analyse different sources of information, including images and social discourse. More than 300 posters were catalogued in a database that allowed the comparison of techniques, typographies, image processing and printing methods, associated organizations and related historical events, among other aspects. The visual and technical study of the posters was then complemented with the qualitative analysis of the producers’ testimony, retrieved through ten in-depth interviews (with three members of Tallersol and seven members of APJ) and two group workshops with all the producers, where they attempted to create a participatory methodology to investigate their experiences and collective memories. The graphic work of both collectives was investigated by looking at the relations, organizational forms and production techniques in three key instances: first, the request made by an external organization or from within the collective itself, then the design of the poster and the development of the print matrix, its subsequent reproduction and, finally, the moment of its distribution. Graphic action and social struggles during the 1980s in Latin America During the 1970s and 1980s, social and cultural experience in Latin America was determined by the impact of the coups that undermined the boldness of the political transformation projects then in progress. Military dictatorships and the violence of civil governments marked a generation of artists, designers and activists, who managed to remain active even in the most adverse conditions. In the case of graphic communication during the 1980s, different collectives from Chile, Peru and Argentina promoted the popularization of techniques, the use of minimal resources, and experimentation with silk-screen printing. The utopian idea of democratization linked to its reproduction capacity was not enough; now it acquired its political meaning in the quest for a new genre of participatory art, ‘whose concept was to use the street as an artistic medium’ [...] it also provided a bond with certain social movements who considered screen printing as their ‘social medium.10 In this context, graphic language incorporated ironic and playful elements which were combined with a strong political confrontation of the ruling regimes. Such is the case of collectives like the Grupo de Artistas Socialistas—Taller de Arte Revolucionario (Group of Socialist Artists—Revolutionary Art Workshop, GAS-TAR), later renamed Colectivo de Arte Participativo Tarifa Común (Common Fare Participatory Art Collective, C.A.Pa.Ta.Co.). This collective was founded by artists whose background was in the Peruvian and Argentine experimental avant-garde, and who collaborated in mobilizations called by human rights and union movements, using street-based graphic actions to resist the military dictatorship, which in Argentina was also known as the ‘National Reorganization Process’. In Buenos Aires, they worked by setting up the screen-printing workshop in the street, doing screen prints applied directly on the pavement, working on street murals based on photocopies (xeroxography), or mass producing ‘participatory posters’ to be completed by anonymous members of the crowd.11 In Peru, the Taller NN (1988–1991) was created by a group of self-taught architects who opened workshops for collaborative discussion and graphic production during the years marked by the state crisis and the coming to power of Fujimori in 1990. They produced stage designs, fliers for film showings, printed artisanal poetry books, and stage sets for rock and anarcho-punk shows, as well as multiple pieces of radical political agitation.12 During this decade, graphic groups in Latin America shared the enthusiasm for a subversive and collective graphic communication deployed in street and underground interventions, dodging the persecution and censorship that besieged the region. Political posters in Chile during the Government of the ‘Unidad Popular’ (Popular Unity) Particularly in the 1960s and at the beginning of the 1970s, posters played a key role in propaganda and in the promotion of the ongoing social democratization programmes. During this period, Chile underwent deep social transformations that paved the way for agrarian and university reform by the end of the 1960s, culminating in the election of Salvador Allende in 1970, who inaugurated the ‘Chilean Way to Socialism’.13 In this context, design built up its own ‘graphic utopia’,14 whereby reproducibility was a means of democratizing art and culture. At the same time, images and slogans were a way of imagining a different Chile. Allende’s government, aided by graphic designers like Vicente and Antonio Larrea, Luis Albornoz, Waldo González and Mario Quiroz, produced hundreds of posters intended to promote the programme of the Unidad Popular in the streets of Chile. Those posters were a materialization of the socialist project, later cut short by the coup d’etat. As a result, graphic communication was more than simply a means to reproduce images, constituting a model of visual pedagogy aimed at strengthening the identification of the people with the ideas of a nation in the midst of a complete transformation.15 The poster ‘A Trabajar’ (Let's work), designed in 1972 by Vicente Larrea, Antonio Larrea and Luis Albornoz, was requested by the Secretaria Juvenil de la Presidencia de la Republica (Secretary of Youth of the Presidency of the Republic). Its purpose was to encourage young citizens to participate in the ‘summer volunteer work’16 organized by the Oficina Nacional de Servicio Voluntario (ONSEV) (National Office of Volunteer Service). The direct and concise slogan ‘A Trabajar’ (Let’s work), which recalls Soviet slogans, was complemented by an illustration portraying two birds building a nest [1]. In the graphic work of this period, it is possible to identify the use of silk-screen printing as well as offset printing, in large formats and four-colour printing. It is apparent in the use of plain colour illustrations, high contrast photographs, lettering—evoking Mexican murals and Cuban posters,17 as well as influences from North American psychedelia—and, of course, the prevalence of dry tansfer typefaces for text design. The political poster occupied the walls of cities throughout Chile, becoming—together with muralist brigades such as the Brigada Ramona Parra and Brigada Elmo Catalán, associated with the Communist Party and the Socialist Party respectively—one of the main components of the visual patrimony of this period. Fig 1. View largeDownload slide Poster of Popular Unity Goverment. ‘A Trabajar’ (Let's work), 1972, by Vicente Larrea, Antonio Larrea, Luis Albornoz. Fig 1. View largeDownload slide Poster of Popular Unity Goverment. ‘A Trabajar’ (Let's work), 1972, by Vicente Larrea, Antonio Larrea, Luis Albornoz. That graphic experience, which was violently interrupted by the military junta on September 11th 1973, is crucial to understanding the development of the political poster in the following years. The massive presence of political posters in the streets, their illustrations, large formats, and brilliant colours, influenced the next generation of graphic workers. Antonio Kadima (Iquique, 1946), a self-taught graphic worker during the dictatorship, and founder of Tallersol Cultural Centre, recognizes this heritage and considers his own work as a ‘missing link’18 between the graphic work carried out during the Popular Unity period and the posters associated with the return to democracy in the 1990s. Graphic emergence during Pinochet's dictatorship After Pinochet’s coup d’etat, the joyful four-colour images comprising the graphic style of the Popular Unity were suddenly banished. Once the military junta took over the country, they began to publish proclamations and decrees that replaced the laws of the Republic, becoming ‘the only normative source and the main media outlet between those who took power, the military and civilians following them, and society at large’.19 Based on them, the dictatorship built a legal apparatus with which to exert its rule, annulling the civil and political rights of the Chilean people, creating a state of war against the threat of Marxism and popular disobedience. One of the first published proclamations, dated September 26th, 1973, directly attacks graphic communication by establishing that Any person caught printing or spreading propaganda that is subversive and undermining of the Supreme Government will suffer the sanctions contemplated by the Military Justice code for times of war.20 Along similar lines, a decree published in 1975 declared that ‘the laws describe as criminals those who are apprehended carrying flyers, pamphlets or leaflets for diffusion of propaganda’.21 In this context, producing political posters against the regime quickly became an act of resistance and defiance. The walls of streets and avenues that used to be covered with posters and murals promoting the Popular Unity programme were cleaned up and covered in white paint as part of the ‘Operación Limpieza’ (Operation Cleansing).22 Thus, the naked violence of the military onslaught that persecuted, tortured, executed and disappeared thousands of persons had a correlate in the symbolic violence of a regime that attempted to eradicate any visible sign and trace of the recent past. This period represented [o]n one hand the disinfection of the Marxist past and, on the other, the promotion of a militarized notion of daily aesthetics, reflected in features such as depuration, order and fervent restoration of patriotic symbols.23 The metaphor of the sick social body was introduced following the Doctrine of National Security promoted by the United States’ foreign policy in the context of the Cold War. This doctrine was intended to encourage the armed forces of Latin American countries to devote themselves exclusively to guaranteeing internal order, in order to combat those ideologies, organizations or movements within each country that could favour or support communism. Hence the imperative to remove all malign elements from the public space, carried out by military and civilian raids that covered the walls of neighbourhoods and avenues in white paint, and military squads that requisitioned books, posters and documents from libraries, houses and social centres in order to burn them in public. The censorship and persecution of dissident signs turned the city of Santiago into what Ana Cortés had long anticipated: ‘a city without shouts posted on the walls would be today almost a silent city’.24 It wouldn’t be long before the streets once again became full of state-sponsored propaganda; only this time instead of promoting ideas of emancipation they became the promoters of an emergent advertising market. In her essay ‘Posters: Advertisement, Art, Political Artifact, Commodity’, Susan Sontag points out that: while the presence of posters used as commercial advertising generally indicates the degree to which a society defines itself as stable, pursuing an economic and political status quo, the presence of political posters generally indicates that the society considers itself in a state of emergency.25 In Chile, under Pinochet’s dictatorship, the two presences were in tension. On the one hand, there was a vigorous advertising boom which, far from being proof of economic stability, was one of the symptoms of the neoliberal onslaught on the country, and on the other, there emerged a general production of political posters of resistance that contended for disputed public space. According to Eduardo Castillo, ‘the State is not the main client for designers any more, yielding to the private company, which concentrated large resources in areas such as corporate image’.26 In the process of this shift, many graphic designers trained at the School of Applied Arts—including prominent figures that had worked for the Popular Unity—began to work on designing logos, brand identities and advertisements, drawing on a strong ‘rationalistic heritage’, privileging neutral, universal and abstract forms, as argued by design historian, Pedro Álvarez.27 Two graphic styles: Agrupación de Plásticos Jóvenes [APJ] and Tallersol Cultural Centre Among the diversity of collectives and organizations that created their own forms of propaganda, it is possible to highlight the role played by APJ and Tallersol both because of their graphic work and their active participation in social, political and cultural spaces from which the resistance was organized. The Tallersol Cultural Centre [2] was founded in 1977 by Antonio Kadima as an autonomous cultural centre, intended for the creation and promotion of poetry, film making, music, muralism and, of course, poster design. The Nueva Gráfica (New Graphics) collective, created by Kadima, together with illustrator Eduardo Gallegos and designer Felipe Martinez, was in charge of poster design. After they split in 1980, Kadima continued producing posters in collaboration with Juan Carlos Gallardo, who was responsible for the screen-printing workshop. Tallersol was one of the first cultural centres founded during this period, and even though it had to relocate more than five times during the 1980s, it maintained its sense of commitment to the social and cultural struggles against the dictatorship. Throughout these years, many people became part of Tallersol for a period of time, but Antonio Kadima has remained in charge of the initiative up to the present day.28 Fig 2. View largeDownload slide Posters by Tallersol exhibited by Antonio Kadima in Berkeley, USA, 1986. Fig 2. View largeDownload slide Posters by Tallersol exhibited by Antonio Kadima in Berkeley, USA, 1986. The APJ was founded in 1979 by students and former students of the School of Arts at the Universidad de Chile, as a way of organizing young artists and taking a stand regarding the situation of the arts within the country [3]. The APJ was created as an open group, with a membership of over 500 people during its eight years of existence.29 Among the people who were part of this group were Havilio Pérez (San Fernando, 1953), Alberto Días Parra, Hugo Sepúlveda, Patricio Rueda (Santiago, 1958), Leonardo Infante and Sonia de los Reyes, who were part of the first generation, later joined by Cucho Márquez (Curicó, 1953), Mario Rosseti, Iván Godoy (Santiago, 1959), Ana María Cisternas, Evelyn Fuchs, Claudia Winther and Janet Toro (Osorno, 1963). The collective was characterized by an assembly-based approach, their commitment to social organizations and working-class neighbourhoods, and also by their use of a wide range of formats, including not only posters, but also performance art, murals and stage design.30 Fig 3. View largeDownload slide APJ members after a collective action in Parque O’Higgins in 1985. Fig 3. View largeDownload slide APJ members after a collective action in Parque O’Higgins in 1985. The graphic backroom: production techniques and collaborative networks At two in the afternoon someone is murdered, someone is imprisoned. At four someone comes to ask us please make known to the world what just happened. At five we’re already working on the format, the design of the poster. Meanwhile we’re trying to find a printing press, people who can work at night. At eight we’re at the press working on the photomechanics and the next day, at seven in the morning, someone comes hurriedly to take the material.31 During the late 1970s and 1980s, the networks of social and cultural organizations spread through the country as part of the struggle to counter the effects of censorship, social fragmentation and the general fear among the population of the regime’s retaliations. As artists, and particularly as graphic designers, both the APJ and Tallersol were part of a social movement of resistance comprising cultural spaces, neighbourhood associations, workers’ unions, underground political parties, human rights groups and student unions, for whom they created hundreds of posters. Based on the analysis of the different phases of production of a poster, it was evident that one of the central issues concerns the social relationships and networks that come into play throughout the process. As an effect of the social and political context, these relations had to operate within specific security constraints (even going underground) as well as relying on mutual aid, resulting in the creation of an extensive network of unlawful activities that was the expression of a ‘graphic social bond’.32 The graphic response to the needs of the social movement was not rooted in clientelism or assistentialism; on the contrary, what was being engendered at every turn was a bond of solidarity and mutual recognition between the graphic workers and other social organizations and movements. Based on the information shown in the catalogued posters of both groups, the first, and one of the foremost, graphic link established by Tallersol was with the world of music, particularly with the ‘peñas’ (underground folk venues) with whom the Taller de Gráfica of Tallersol worked in the promotion of their concerts and activities. Among the most emblematic peñas in Santiago during the reorganization of the underground musical scene of the mid-1970s were the Peña Doña Javiera and La Casona San Isidro y La Parra. The peñas were the first meeting spaces associated with music where it was possible to reconstitute those bonds of trust that were broken by the dictatorship, as well as preserving the musical heritage of the Left that, like the murals and posters, was strongly repressed. Later, by the end of the 1970s, when union activity and labour struggles were re-established, one of the priorities in Tallersol’s activity was the collaboration with unions. Such was the case with the Santiago Electrical Workers Union, the National Union Committee of the Chilean Communist Youth (CONASIN) and the Elevator Operators Union, among others. Likewise, Tallersol maintained a close relationship with other major actors in the popular resistance; the neighbourhood organizations, through the Coordinadora de Organizaciones Poblacionales (Neighbourhood Organizations Coordinating Committee, COAPO), the student and youth groups such as the Agrupación de Estudiantes Medios (High School Students Group, AEM), the Parroquia Universitaria (University Parish) and the Pastoral Juvenil (Youth Ministry), and others. Lastly, although Tallersol did not depend on any political party, they were close to some sectors of the revolutionary Left, such as the Movimiento de Izquierda Revolucionaria (Revolutionary Left Movement, MIR), the Movimiento Democrático Popular (Democratic Popular Movement, MDP) and the Movimiento Juvenil Democrático Popular (Youth Democratic Popular Movement, MJDP), as well as the Mesa de Concertación Social (Social Agreement Table) of the central area of Santiago, for whom they designed posters. Tallersol also had an important relationship with human rights groups and institutions such as the Agrupación de Familiares de Presos Políticos (Association of Relatives of Political Prisioners, AFPP) and the Comité pro Retorno de Exiliados (Committee for the Return of Exiles). Possibly the most important relationship along Tallersol’s trajectory—which was, by the way, shared with the APJ—was that established with the Comité de Defensa de los Derechos del Pueblo (Committee for the Defense of the People’s Rights, CODEPU), an organization that defended the human rights of armed resistance groups.33 The APJ, for its part, was closer to the visual arts circuit through its sporadic participation in exhibitions held by alternative workshops and galleries in downtown Santiago. Along with this, its graphic production was directly related to anti-dictatorship organizations in neighbourhoods, unions, universities and human rights groups. This relationship was built up through workshops and activities for children and young people in, among others, Lo Hermida, a popular neighbourhood in the commune of Peñalolén, and the La Victoria neighbourhood in the municipality of Pedro Aguirre Cerda. The AJP worked constantly, just like Tallersol, with human rights organizations, such as the Agrupación de Familiares de Detenidos Desaparecidos (Association of Relatives of the Detained-Disappeared, AFDD), Cristianos por los Derechos del Pueblo (Christians for the People’s Rights, CRIDEPU), CODEPU and AFPP. One of the main lines of collaboration was with unions to which some of the APJ members were affiliated and with whom they not only created posters but also social communication workshops and internal newsletters; such is the case with the Confederación Nacional de Federaciones y Sindicatos de Trabajadores Metalurgicos (National Confederacy of Metalworkers, CONSTRAMET). Youth and students organizations were present too, such as the Agrupación Zonal de Organismos Juveniles and the Comisión Chilena pro Derechos Juveniles (Chilean Comission for the Youth Rights, CODEJU), and others affiliated to parties: the MJDP and the Unión Nacional de Estudiantes Democráticos (National Union of Democratic Students, UNED), which was by then the MIR’s student front organization.34 The creation of a poster would begin with an early-morning phone call or the urgent visit of a friend who came asking for help with the dissemination of news in the neighbourhood or the union hall. This initial moment could result from one of a number of circumstances: ‘maybe someone was killed, maybe they had a cultural gathering, a colloquium, maybe they needed help publicizing a denunciation, in any case they would reach out to us’.35 In some cases, the organization requesting a poster would contribute pictures and a slogan and, if applicable, the logos or names of other organizations subscribing to the denunciation or invitation. In most cases, the request would include no payment other than the cost of the required materials, which supporting that even if in some cases the production of posters was a paid job, both collectives assumed the production of many posters as an act of solidarity with the only goal being that of contributing to the struggle of those who asked for their help.36 Once the request was made, how the graphic workers proceeded to design the poster varied according to the way in which each collective was organized to respond to these commissions, the techniques used to process images and texts and, of course, the urgency of the matter. Considering the diversity of members of both collectives, the internal rotation and the various changes that they incorporated into their practices, their activity as graphic workers was the result of a process of continual learning and experimentation that led them to create different visuals and techniques.37 APJ discussed the commissions they received in periodic meetings before distributing them among the working groups that would execute each project. As Patricio Rueda, one of the founders of APJ points out, ‘everything was political: the way we organized our meetings, the way we debated, the way we built proposals. Imagine, we in the Eighties, working together in assemblies, just like today’s student movement’.38 In direct opposition to the hegemony of individualism, competition and social distrust, the collaborative and democratic methodologies of the APJ formed a micropolitical alternative of resistance. This partially explains the heterogeneity of their collective work, to the extent that it is difficult to talk about a unique or predominant style: ‘there is no singular line. There must be around ten graphic styles associated with the different teams that were created’.39 On the other hand, even in those posters produced by a single member of the group, individual authorship yielded to collective signature: the priority was to assert the collective character of the work after each piece. It is interesting to note that the option of collectivising authorship is a feature that is also present in the posters developed during May 1968 by the Atelier Populaire. As Badenes suggests, the students preferred an anonymous and collective work to protect identities and to reinforce collective demand.40 Despite its diversity, it is possible to perceive repeated actions in the work of the APJ that contribute to the emergence of a recognizable aesthetic, characterized by the mixture of printing techniques and graphic resources. The work with photomontage using official press clips later interspersed with serigraphy stands out, as a denunciation of police framings and false news that covered up state violence. The ‘1984 Series’, made up of twenty-seven prints of 45 x 35 centimetres each and created by the APJ, comprised a mural-like work that was meant to be displayed outside union halls and community centres in popular neighbourhoods [4] [5]. In the series, the clips and photographs were enlarged, set in high contrast and then interspersed with signs, and crossed out in red, to resemble proofreading marks made by a news editor, making them look like counter-editions of newspaper front pages. Frequently, the APJ also created realistic illustrations with the use of charcoal and rapidograph, mostly to representat the faces of people who had been executed, imprisoned or disappeared. The power of the portrait as a means of humanizing the victims and denouncing the perpetrators was one of the resources most frequently utilized by the human rights organizations. They sought to counter the media veil that denied the existence of the disappeared or else promoted an image that demonized them, representing them to the public as enemies of the nation. The AJP also worked with stencils to print on paper and even on walls in muralistic interventions, experimented with the use of silk-screening on photocopies, and included lab-modified photographs in their compositions. As for the text, the use of lettering and handwriting stands out, techniques that admit a high degree of expressivity, frequently used in slogans that demanded the fall of the regime and defended human rights. The poster ‘Justice’ [6], made by the APJ in 1986, has in its left upper section photographs of the brothers Rafael and Eduardo Vergara, from the Villa Francia neighbourhood and members of the MIR, who were murdered by agents of the police, and on the right, a portrait of the three communist militants who were kidnapped and executed in a case that later would be known as the ‘Slit Throats Case’ (Caso Degollados—Santiago Nattino, Manuel Guerrero and José Manuel Parada, left to right respectively). It the centre, between these two recognized victims, appears the face of Paulina Aguirre, a young MIR militant who was murdered the same night the Vergara brothers were killed, but whose death went unnoticed at the time. The sum of all these characters with different affiliations and political traditions reflects the prevalence of solidarity and commonality over ideological differences in the APJ. Under the pictures of the five victims, and indicated by a subtle arrow, there is a photograph of the funeral of the Vergara brothers taken by a member of the APJ, Cucho Márquez, where it is possible to see, at the forefront, two women raising their fists, an unmistakable sign of popular resistance next to the handwritten slogan that demands ‘Justice’. Fig 4. View largeDownload slide ‘Series 1984’, 1984, by APJ. Photocopy and Silk-Screen. Fig 4. View largeDownload slide ‘Series 1984’, 1984, by APJ. Photocopy and Silk-Screen. Fig 5. View largeDownload slide Print from the "1984 Series", 1984, by APJ. Photocopy and Silk-Screen. Fig 5. View largeDownload slide Print from the "1984 Series", 1984, by APJ. Photocopy and Silk-Screen. Fig 6. View largeDownload slide ‘Justicia’ (Justice), 1986, by APJ. Offset Fig 6. View largeDownload slide ‘Justicia’ (Justice), 1986, by APJ. Offset The graphic language of Tallersol, for its part, remained a lot more homogeneous despite the fact that key members rotated and Antonio Kadima was the only member who stayed throughout the dictatorship. During an initial period, they would distribute the design of commissioned posters for concerts and folk-music performances according to members’ expertise: typography would be assigned to Antonio Kadima and Felipe Martínez, and illustrations to Eduardo ‘Lalo’ Gallegos. Gallegos’ drawings present an iconography loaded with guitars, children, workers, students and musicians, a naive and cartoonish imagery that reveals the influence of the posters of the Unidad Popular.41 Once Gallegos and Martinez left Tallersol in 1982, Antonio Kadima developed an even more recognizable style of his own, both in the treatment of images and in his typographic design. In his work one can find a synthetic visuality, generally made of high contrast images, created in the photographic lab and on the photocopy machine. As for the text, just like the APJ, the use of lettering was frequent, which contrasted with the use of transfer lettering also known as Letraset, widely used at the workshop. These letters were often hand copied and later re-utilized in order to avoid the costs of purchasing them again. Another strategy used by Kadima was that of creating his own typefaces for posters’ slogans by cutting letters using a box cutter. His illustrations were characterized by an irregular and broken stroke, distancing Kadima from the rationalistic and modern aesthetic, and coming closer to a more artisanal and baroque style, exposing the freehand work on the images. The poster ‘An end to exile’ is a clear example of the visual identity created by Kadima, based on high-contrast drawings and a synthetic aesthetic directly evoking the idea of a shout on the wall [7]. The poster was developed for the Encuentro de Reflexión y Lucha, (Gathering for Reflection and Struggle) organized by the Comité pro Retorno de Exiliados (Committee for the Return of Exiles) and the Comision Antirepresiva del Pueblo (People’s Anti-Repression Commission). Fig 7. View largeDownload slide ‘Fin al exilio’ (End to exile), 1983, by Tallersol. Fig 7. View largeDownload slide ‘Fin al exilio’ (End to exile), 1983, by Tallersol. When it came time to print the posters, it was crucial to devise strategies to overcome censorship and uncertainty, and of course, the risk of losing the material to the police. The posters done by both groups show experimentation with diverse means of reproduction, from the most artisanal, like hectograph, mimeograph and silk-screening, to other techniques more industrial in their nature, such as photocopying and offset printing. The use of the more artisanal techniques was associated with greater autonomy and accessibility, for they demanded less equipment and could be used even in domestic spaces. The mimeograph—in the case of the APJ—and the hectograph—for Tallersol— were the least technical reproduction methods they ever used. Due to the low reproduction capacity and precarious outcome, only a few pieces printed with these techniques remain in the rchives consulted. Both collectives adopted silk-screen printing as one of their main printing methods, enabling them to increase the size and number of prints they produced and, at the same time, strengthening their visual impact. To respond to the need for a specialized printshop, some members of APJ set up workshops in their houses in order to have complete control over what they printed. That was the case with Hugo Sepúlveda who, when the reality of a coup was imminent, set up a workshop at home and stocked up with paints and materials.42 At the Tallersol Cultural Centre a screen-printing shop was built in 1985, thanks to the donation of materials by Lincoln Cushing, an American graphic designer and investigator who travelled to Chile to organize workshops and give support to the resistance movement.43 The use of serigraphy enabled both collectives to experiment with different papers and the inks they were able to acquire, mainly black, red and on certain occasions special inks in flashier colours. Unlike silk-screening, the use of industrial printing techniques required larger facilities, which is why APJ and Tallersol members had to approach the owners, printers and machine operators at printing shops and photocopy centres in their neighbourhoods. They developed a relationship of active solidarity with all of them, which became another expression of the graphic social bond established at this time with those who agreed to print their designs while being aware of the risks involved. At times, in order to reduce the costs and to speed up reproduction they would intervene and adapt technologies and procedures. In the case of offset printing, for example, they would change the metal plate for a paper one.44 Cheaper and easily disposable, even though it was weaker and produced aworn effect due to ink absorption on the paper plate, it became a safe alternative for political posters produced under a regime of persecution. Once the posters were printed, the organizations that had commissioned them would, ideally, come back to pick up the material and start its distribution. This might be the most important moment in the journey of these posters, for it was their chance to transgress the regime’s communications lockdown in public spaces. Considering the impossibility of displaying posters in public spaces such as main avenues and downtown streets, posters could be found in the interstices of the city such as at bus stops, in public toilets, university halls and on the side streets in the outskirts of the city.45 Furthermore, in view of the costs and effort involved in the creation of each poster, some of them were designed for quiet contemlation and meant to be displayed in secure places such as the peñas, inside union halls, cultural centres and offices of human rights organizations. More than shouts on the wall, they were visual essays containing information and details about disappeared persons, denunciations and activities. Later, in the 1980s, especially during the National Days of Protest that began in 1983, when marches and public demonstrations first took place in the streets, and lasted until 1986, political posters returned to the main streets and avenues. Only this time, posters were not posted on the wall but rather circulated in the hands of the protesters who carried them like banners during marches and processions, next to the flags of mobilized groups. Backroom politics The political poster developed during the dictatorship in Chile has not had its rightful acknowledgement in the reconstruction of a national graphic tradition.46 For years, this period has been understood as a parenthesis in the historiography of Chilean design, positioned between the bright posters produced under the Popular Unity programme until September 1973, and the rainbow colours of the iconography used for the ‘No’ campaign seventeen years later, in the plebiscite that overthrew Pinochet in 1989. Between these two heroic periods of graphic design that shared an enthusiasm for four-color printing, there is a graphic stroke that resisted by using monochrome, small formats and low-weight papers. Graphic communication during the military dictatorship became a social practice of resistance, collective creation and regeneration of the social fabric. From their foundation, APJ and Tallersol were two of the main producers of posters, leaflets, and bulletins for social, political and cultural organizations that required support in the dissemination, denunciation of and dispute against the censorship of the regime and the official media. The collectives’ participation in the resistance network was linked directly to its capacity to generate bonds of collaboration and solidarity with different social actors that made the design, printing and distribution of the posters possible even under the most adverse conditions. Thus, focusing on the graphic backroom enables us to notice and assess the strength of the posters as pieces that are a testimony not only to the slogan or the printed image but also to the network of collaborations in which they were forged and the creative effort needed to broaden their impact and effect. The graphic backrooms of the APJ and Tallersol embody the power of a committed practice that prefigured the demands for freedom and democracy printed in their slogans, and reveals the way they experienced the political as action, based on collective and autonomous participation. Here the micropolitical dimension to the collectives’ practice without removing itself from the contingency of the macropolitical context, brings to light aspects of graphic production that have been generally underestimated or ignored. The final result of every poster is but the peak moment of a production process that was built against the grain of the dominant trend of commercial graphic design, where the relationship between counterparts was not mediated by a client-provider connection, but by their active political and social cooperation, thus broadening a graphic-producing network among militants, graphic industry workers, cultural agents, unionists and relatives of the disappeared, among many others. This was a practice that contributed to the reconstruction of a social fabric that was fragmented by mistrust, competition and individualism, values promoted by the historical alliance between the dictatorship and neoliberal economics. Therefore, just like other experiences of artistic activism, graphic communication became a political aesthetic practice that can be characterized by the collectivization of graphic production, the constitution of active networks of solidarity, technological innovation and the use of minimal resources. Today it is possible to connect the experience of APJ and Tallersol with that of the new graphic groups that have returned to the streets in the cycle of mobilizations triggered by the struggle for public education by the student movement in Chile. Despite the current prevalence of digital printing techniques and social media networks, usually presented as the new public sphere, the presence of screen-printed posters on the walls of the city is widespread.47 Finally, the study of graphic collectives’ work and their inclusion in the history of Latin American design is relevant because it rescues an experience of graphic resistance that can become a point of reference for the political struggles and graphic expression of future generations. On a larger scale, its study also contributes to broadening the way in which the illustrative relation between graphic communication and politics has been conceived of pointing towards a method of analysis and interpretation that examines the complex interaction between the macro- and the micropolitical in these graphic practices. Focusing on processes in the study of the production experience of collectives such as APJ and Tallersol allows us to appreciate the scope and political power of resistance poster as expessions of a network of complicity, experimentation and collaborative work. If you have any comments to make in relation to this article, please go to the journal website ons://jdh.oxfordjournals.organd access this article. There is a facility on the site for sending e-mail responses to the editorial board and other readers. Designer and Degree in Aesthetics in Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile. Lecturer of History and Theory of Design at the School of Design in Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile and Universidad de Chile. Researcher on design history, the relationship between graphic communication and politics in Chile and Latin America. Co-author of the book Resistencia Gráfica, Dictadura en Chile APJ-Tallersol (Cristi & Manzi, 2016), and the chapter ‘A des sitiar Chile’ (Cristi, 2013) in El Afiche Politico en Chile 1973–2012 (Vico, 2013). Project coordinator of ‘R. Red archivo de la resistencia’, in the Red de Conceptualismo del Sur, aimed at the rescue, conservation, and dissemination of material made during the military dictatorship in Chile. Student of MA Material and Visual Culture in Anthropology in University College of London. Sociologist from Universidad de Chile. Lecturer, archivist and independent researcher on the relation between art, politics, feminism and social struggles in Chile and Latin America. Co-author of the book Resistencia gráfica. Dictadura en Chile APJ-Tallersol (Cristi & Manzi, 2016). Curator of the exhibition ‘Poner el cuerpo. Llamamientos de arte y política en los años ochenta en América Latina’ (Museo de la Solidaridad Salvador Allende, Santiago, 2016) and ‘A la calle nuevamente, Gráfica y movimiento estudiantil en Chile’ (Casa de las Américas, La Habana, 2016). Member of the Nucleus of Graphics and Student Mobilization at Universidad de Chile and of the Red de Conceptualismos del Sur and project coordinator of ‘R. Red archivo de la resistencia’. Currently teaches Sociology of Art at Universidad ARCIS. Footnotes 1 Enrique Vergara-Leyton, Claudio Garrido-Peña and Camila Undurraga-Puelma. La gráfica como artefacto cultural. Una aproximación semiótica al cartel social en Chile. Arte, Individuo y Sociedad 26, no.2, (2014): 367–381. 2 Mario Osses and Mauricio Vico, Un grito en la pared: psicodelia, compromiso político y exilio en el cartel político en Chile. Santiago: Ocho Libros/Dibam, Santiago, 2009. 3 Francisca Valdebenito, Tinta papel, ingenio. Panfletos políticos en Chile 1973–1990. Santiago: Ocho Libros, Santiago, 2010. 4 Walter Benjamin, ‘The author as producer’. In Understanding Brecht, trans. Anna Bostock (London: Verso, London, 1998), 87. 5 David Edgerton, ‘De la innovacion al uso. Diez tesis eclécticas sobre la historiografía de las técnicas’, Quaderns d’història de l’enginyeria, 6 (2004): 2. 6 Fernanda Carvajal, André Mesquita and Jaime Vindel, eds, Losing the Human Form. A seismic image of the 1980s in Latin America. Madrid: Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, 2014. 7 Ana Longoni, ‘Activismo artístico en la última década en Argentina: algunas acciones en torno a la segunda desaparición de Jorge Julio López’. Errata 0 (2009):16–35, 18. 8 Marcelo Expósito, Ana Vidal, Jaime Vindel, ‘Artistic Activism’, in Losing the Human Form. A seismic image of the 1980s in Latin America, ed. Fernanda Carvajal, André Mesquita and Jaime Vindel (Madrid: Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, 2014), 279. 9 Expósito, Vidal and Vindel, op. cit., 282. 10 Miguel López, ‘Acción gráfica’, in Losing the Human Form. A seismic image of the 1980s in Latin America, ed. Fernanda Carvajal, André Mesquita and Jaime Vindel (Madrid: Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, 2014), 319. 11 López, op. cit., 320. 12 López, op. cit., 321. 13 Tomás Moulian, Chile anatomía de un mito. Santiago: LOM Ediciones, 1997. 14 Nicole Cristi and Javiera Manzi, Resistencia gráfica: dictadura en Chile, APJ-Tallersol (Santiago: LOM Ediciones, 2016), 32. 15 Osses and Vico, op.cit.. 16 ‘Summer work’ was a common way in Chile to refer to volunteer work in the holiday season. 17 Mario Osses and Mauricio Vico, ‘Aproximación a los carteles de la Unidad Popular (1970–1973)’, Cátedra de Artes 5 (2008): 23. http://catedradeartes.uc.cl/pdf/Catedra5-02VicoOsses.pdf, accessed 11 November, 2016. 18 Antonio Kadima, quoted from Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 262. 19 Manuel Garretón, Roberto Garretón and Carmen Garretón, Por la fuerza sin la razón, (Santiago: LOM Ediciones, 1998), 51. 20 Junta de Gobierno de las Fuerzas Armadas y Carabineros de Chile, ‘Bando Nº32’, El Mercurio, September 26, 1973. 21 Ministerio de Justicia, ‘Decreto-Ley 1009. Sistematiza normas sobre protección jurídica de los derechos procesales de los detenidos por delitos contra la seguridad nacional por los organismos que indica y modifica disposiciones legales que señala’, Diario Oficial, May 8, 1975. 22 Luis H. Errázurriz and Gonzalo Leiva, El golpe estético. Dictadura militar en Chile: 1973–1989. Santiago: Ocho Libros, 2012. 23 Errázuriz and Leiva, op. cit., 15. 24 Ana Cortés, ‘Ensayo para una reseña de la historia del afiche en Chile’, Revista de Arte de la Universidad de Chile, 15 (1937). 25 Susan Sontag, ‘Posters: Advertisement, Art, Political Artifact, Commodity’, In The Art of Revolution: 96 Posters from Cuba, ed Dugald Stermer (London: Pall Mall Press, 1970), xiii. 26 Eduardo Castillo, ‘El cartel en Chile: una tradición pendiente’, Revista 180 24, (2009): 40. 27 Pedro Álvarez, Historia del Diseño Gráfico en Chile (Santiago: Pontifica Universidad Católica de Chile, 2004), 145. 28 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 97. 29 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 68. 30 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 68–86. 31 Kadima, Antonio. Interview with the authors, 17 June 2013 quoted in Cristi and Manzi, op.cit., 134. 32 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 133. 33 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 133. 34 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 134. 35 Antonio Kadima, Interview with the authors, 17 June 2013 quoted in Cristi and Manzi, op.cit., 135. 36 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 135. 37 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 143. 38 Patricio Rueda, Interview with the authors, 30 June 2013, quoted from Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 74. 39 Patricio Rueda, Interview with the authors, 11 June 2013, quoted from Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 143. 40 Patricia Badenes, La estética en las barricadas (Castello de la Plana: Universitat Jaume, Castello de la Plana, 2006), 280. 41 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 144. 42 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 150. 43 Lincoln Cushing, Chilean Cultural Exchange Project,http://www.docspopuli.org/articles/Chile/ChileCulture.html, accessed 10 November, 2016. 44 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 150. 45 Cristi and Manzi, op. cit., 152. 46 The publications about graphic communication during the dictatorial period include Francisca Valdebenito, Tinta, Papel e Ingenio (2010); “L” Memoria gráfica del exilio chileno en Chile 1973–1989 by Estela Aguirre and Sonia Chamorro (2009); the chapter ‘A des-sitiar Chile’ by Nicole Cristi in El afiche político en Chile 1970–2013, ed. Mauricio Vico (2013) and the book Resistencia gráfica, Dictadura en Chile, APJ-Tallersol by Nicole Cristi & Javiera Manzi. 47 Among these groups are Taller de Serigrafía Instantánea (‘Instant Serigraphy Workshop’), Brigada de Propaganda Feminista (‘Feminist Propaganda Brigade’), Seri-insurgentes collective and Ser & Gráfica collective. © The Author(s) [2018]. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Design History Society. All rights reserved. This article is published and distributed under the terms of the Oxford University Press, Standard Journals Publication Model (https://academic.oup.com/journals/pages/open_access/funder_policies/chorus/standard_publication_model)
TI - Political Resistance Posters During Pinochet’s Dictatorship in Chile: Approaching the Graphic Backroom
JF - Journal of Design History
DO - 10.1093/jdh/epy013
DA - 2019-02-28
UR - https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/oxford-university-press/political-resistance-posters-during-pinochet-s-dictatorship-in-chile-iNo20bCDh9
SP - 69
VL - 32
IS - 1
DP - DeepDyve
ER -