The viceroys of Peru, rulers from 1543 to 1821, were depicted in official portraits following very rigid models to emphasize political power and emphasize theatricality. Unlike many other colonial-era cultural artifacts that were destroyed during the independence movements of the 19th century, including portraits of the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata, these paintings were preserved in what is today the National Museum of Archaeology, Anthropology and History in Lima to affirm a continuity between the viceregal institutionality and the new republican structure. Images have become part of the Peruvian historical imagination. In the large-format paintings in his exhibition “Virrey not to be Rey” (“Viceroy Not to Be King”), Peruvian artist Andrés Argüelles Vigo erased, blurred, swapped elements and added new components to the original viceroyal portraits, using layers of fiction and parody to reflect on shared historical discourses and the situation we Peruvians face amid current national and global crises.
Argüelles Vigo’s recent work has focused on analyzing the constitution of art historical narratives and how audiences relate to cultural objects. Often he sought out subjects that finished in “second place” – those who were not considered winners and whose value may be overlooked but who might continue to aspire to greater historical significance. In this way he explored icons and characters suspended in the potentiality of what can be achieved after defeat. In this new work centered on the viceroys of Peru, men who were the representatives of the distant king, he brought to light characters who, despite all their power, took second place to the monarch. Argüelles Vigo has always conducted these historical studies through an exploration of pictorial language and its formats. In “Virrey not to be Rey”, his experimentation with the painted surface, constructed through layers of glaze, coexists with the deployment of paint as an installation. The fluidity of the paint gives vitality to compositions where silence and absence prevail.
The original viceroy portraits included background draperies, heraldic shields, workspaces or tables, and command batons. Argüelles Vigo brings these basic elements to the fore. Some of the leaders seem to be disappearing, leaving only the symbols of their political power to represent their existence. In other compositions, the central position of the viceroy is occupied by a green Power Ranger who, according to the plot of the television series, has been forced to submit to the domination of the show’s protagonist: the Power Ranger. red. The canvases also depict a large-scale Pepsi can and a pair of gazelles, respectively the second-largest cola brand on the consumer market and one of the finalists for the title of fastest animal on earth. For Argüelles Vigo, the competing imperatives of contemporary life are part of new modes of coloniality that affect everyone. From a country whose power relations have always relegated it to the background, it invites the viewer to resist today’s dog-eating dog world and recognize, from our humble position as finalist, that at the In the midst of a global crisis, it is necessary to imagine new, less hierarchical perspectives.
Translated from Spanish by Michèle Faguet.
