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Orgullo y Prejuicio

Art in Argentina in the 90s and Beyond
Chapter IV

ALBERTO GOLDENSTEIN

This fourth chapter of Pride and Prejudice features the work of Alberto Goldenstein (Buenos Aires, 1951). A key figure in contemporary Argentine photography, Goldenstein emerged on the art scene in the late eighties as part of the group of artists associated with the Centro Cultural Rojas. He proposed a novel approach to the medium developing an aesthetic based on the snapshot, a bold use of color, and an emphasis on the act of looking to capture everyday life —“placing the viewer’s eye where my eye is”—, his camera’s lens becoming an extension of his subjectivity.

Goldenstein has had great influence on contemporary Argentine photography as the curator of the Rojas photo gallery and as a teacher of younger generations during decades. In 2018, the Museum of Modern Art of Buenos Aires held a major retrospective of his work curated by Carla Barbero. His works are in the photography collections of the Museo de Arte Moderno de Buenos Aires, the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, the Museo Castagnino in Rosario, the Museo de Arte Latinamericano en Buenos Aires (MALBA), as well as private collections in Argentina and abroad.

ORGULLO Y PREJUICIO
Art in Argentina in the 90 and beyond.

Chapter I. Introduction.
Chapter II. Teen Conceptualism / Didactic Conceptualism
Chapter III. Fernanda Laguna
Chapter IV. Alberto Goldenstein

Alberto Goldenstein - st de la serie Americanas 1982-1983
Boston 1982, #10, from the series Americanas, 1982.

ALBERTO GOLDENSTEIN.

By Francisco Lemus

In the early nineteen-eighties, Alberto Goldenstein quit his well-paid job at a bank to follow his true desire. He was thirty years old. He won a scholarship and went to Boston to study at the New England School of Photography. He made the most of that experience. Some of the seminars at the school were taught by acclaimed photographers, but those were not the ones that made the greatest impression on him. Barry Kiperman, an editorial photographer and painter, was the one who taught him to think of photography in terms of art. And it was through Linda Mahoney, a portraitist, that he came into contact with the work of Robert Frank. In one of Mahoney’s classes, she projected the images of Frank’s essay The Americans while reading the Ginsberg poem that goes, “America, stop pushing, I know what I am doing.”

In that frigid city, he decided how he would look, that is, the nature of his gaze. And when he returned to Buenos Aires, the contrast was glaring. The city was in the midst of the restoration of democracy after seven years of military rule, and photographers were interested in observing public life, in politics. Alberto felt like a fish out of water, and so he knew just what to look at. He envisioned photography as matter, as material; it has no need for poses or lofty symbols, it can even forego human action altogether. He imagines photography as a living body, with no form or identity, that can feed on anything at all: a group of drab apartment buildings, a cup of tea, a rug, a texture, a segment of the Casa Rosada (the seat of Argentina’s executive branch), a friend at a nightclub, an arm, another artist’s work.

Alberto divided the waters in Argentine photography. He took flight from style, from the themes that run deep in the country; he tried to conceive of photography in the most common terms possible. He can go from being a meticulous flâneur to a family photographer. His work does not bear an authorial mark, but the mark of many authors all at once. In the library in his studio, you can find books of popular photographers from the United States—nothing strange: Avedon’s celebrities mingle with Eggleston’s suburbs, David Hopper’s silent apartments with Walker Evans’s lined faces. These affinities tie him to art and distance him from vocation.

In 1995, he began directing the Fotogalería on the upper level of the Centro Cultural Rojas (the images of the nineties paved the way from that venue in the Buenos Aires garment district). His vision was no longer solitary. His curiosity unfurled in the work of the young people he invited to exhibit but—indeed mostly—in the critiques he directed. Photography’s relevance began to exceed the documentary; it moved closer to the terrain of contemporary art in Argentina than it ever had before.

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He is a photographer who chooses to break up compositions, to make maverick use of the camera. Some of his photographs are from the analog era, others—the ones he takes with his cell phone—are more recent. El mundo del arte (The Art World), the series of photos of his friends, of the people who were right in the thick of it—building a scene, having fun, saying goodbye to lovers who were dying of AIDS—was taken with a pocket camera. He could not frame with the direct viewfinder of a pocket camera as he could with a reflex, but he did not want to end up taking family photos. His artist friends faced a similar problem: I have this basin, this box, this piece of wood, and I want to take it out of its domestic setting without it losing its charm entirely. That’s how you make art—it might seem simple, but it’s not.

As a photographer, and as a curator, he always explores uncomfortable terrain. He is little understood in his home gild (the photographers’ gild), and he often fails to meet the expectations of art institutions. When he gets bored of slapdash images, he climbs up a flight of stairs and frames perfectly a monument lost somewhere in the city. He flees everything, even melancholy. Sometimes he vexes us. The same author who portrays a neoclassical statue stands on the corner of Corrientes and Pueyrredón avenues—an intersection where architecture is lost amidst so many competing billboards—and shoots his camera. More than once, he has invited photographers whom the documentary eye deems superficial to show work. Alberto, like everyone, defines himself according to who he has in front of him. But he raises the stakes. And that means eluding categories, it means truly open tastes.

Alberto Goldenstein’s photographs are somehow close at hand; anyone could take them. They are open images, never closed-off or distant “great works.” In that determination to shake off any antiquated gesture lies a lesson—and many have learned from it. Without setting out to, he has become a mentor.

  • Hoja de sala de la exposición El Mundo del Arte de Alberto Goldenstein, Galería de Artes Visuales del Centro Cultural Rojas, 1993
  • Hoja de sala de la exposición El Mundo del Arte de Alberto Goldenstein, Galería de Artes Visuales del Centro Cultural Rojas, 1993
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Invitation for the exhibition Tutti frutti, 1991.
Printed sheet for the exhibition El Mundo del Arte, 1993.

El mundo del arte series

Alberto Goldenstein, Alfredo Londaibere en nuestra casa, serie El mundo del arte, 1988, copia tipo C, 20 x 25 cm
Alfredo Londaibere at our home, 1988.
Alberto Goldenstein, Kiwi Sainz, cumpleaños de Roberto Jacoby, 1992
Kiwi Sainz, Roberto Jacoby’s birthday party, 1992.
Alberto Goldenstein - Feliciano Centurión, Bar Bolivia, serie El mundo del arte, 1989
Feliciano Centurión, Bar Bolivia, 1989.

“I am interested in the tie between photography and poetry. I think of photos as words with which to assemble relationships that are not narrative, but revelatory. Photography, for me, exists in the vacuum of the laboratory; it is not bound to a function or theme, or any sort of rational logic. Photographs are like words for a poet.”

Alberto Goldenstein
Alberto Goldenstein - Bill Arning y su pareja, 1995
Bill Arning and his partner, 1995.
Alberto Goldesntein - Pablo Suarez en su taller, 1993
Pablo Suárez at his studio, 1993.
Alberto Goldenstein - Martin-Di-Girolamo-en-mi-casa,-1995
Martín Di Girolamo at my home, 1995.
Alberto-Goldesntein---Cumpleaños-de-Fernanda-Laguna-en-su-casa,-1998
Fernanda Laguna’s birthday party at her house, 1998.
Alberto-Goldenstein---Gumier-Maier-y-Elba-Bairon,-casa-de-Ana-López,-ca.1996
Gumier Maier and Elba Bairon, Ana López’s house, ca.1996.
Alberto-Goldenstein---Autorretrato-con-amigos,-Galería-Ruth-Benzacar,-1996
Self-Portrait with friends, Galería Ruth Benzacar, 1996.

“Art was more bohemian and personal encounters were key to exchanging information. As artists of the post-dictatorship, we were fed up with the past and hungry to celebrate pleasure, life—and the Rojas articulated that impulse. I felt the need to document what was going on against the grain of the canon and proper photographic composition. At play in these photos, and how I took them, was the fresh energy of the moment, but also the intention to dialogue with the history of photography. I was playing, but seriously.”

Alberto Goldenstein
Alberto Goldenstein, El mundo del arte (1989-2002). Video, 10 minutes, 2018.

Flâneur series

Alberto Goldenstein, Sin título, serie Flâneur, 1988, fotografía analógica, 27 x 39 cm
Untitled, 1988.

“I am not interested in the isolated photographic image, as an icon, but in how the photographer comes into being, photo after photo. I never photograph a single thing; I photograph relationships between things or persons: a monument in relation to a landscape, people in relation to the city; architecture in relation to space, clusters of friends. A tangle of interconnected things.”

Alberto Goldenstein
Alberto Goldenstein, Barrio Once, serie Flâneur, 2004, fotografía analógica, 27 x 39 cm
Barrio Once, 2004.
Alberto Goldenstein, Complejo Catalinas Norte, serie Flâneur, 2004, fotografía analógica, 27 x 39 cm
Complejo Catalinas Norte, 2004.
Alberto Goldenstein, Barrio San Telmo, serie Flâneur, 2004, fotografía analógica, 27 x 39 cm
Barrio San Telmo, 2004.
Alberto Goldenstein, Barrio La Boca, serie Flâneur, 2004, fotografía analógica, 27 x 39 cm
Barrio La Boca, 2004.
Alberto Goldenstein, Monumento a España, Costanera Sur, serie Flâneur, 2004, fotografía analógica, 27 x 39 cm
Monumento a España, Costanera Sur, 2004.
Alberto Goldenstein, Barrio Puerto Madero, serie Flâneur, 2004, fotografía analógica, 27 x 39 cm
Barrio Puerto Madero, 2004.
Alberto Goldenstein, Arquero San Sebastián, serie Flâneur, 2004, fotografía analógica, 27 x 39 cm
Arquero San Sebastián, 2004.
Alberto Goldenstein, Av. 9 de Julio, serie Flâneur, 2004, fotografía analógica, 27 x 39 cm
Av. 9 de Julio, 2004.
Alberto Goldenstein, Barrio Liniers, serie Flâneur, 2004, fotografía analógica, 27 x 39 cm
Barrio Liniers, 2004.
Alberto Goldenstein, Cómo soy (text),Villa Gesell (photographs), April 2020, 1 minute.
Click for translation

Conversaciones series

Alberto Goldenstein, Conversación-#17, 2020, copia tipo C
 Conversación #17, 2020.
Alberto Goldenstein, Conversación-#3, 2020, copia tipo C
 Conversación #3, 2020.
Alberto Goldenstein, Conversación #7, 2020, copia tipo C
Conversación #7, 2020.

“In 2018, I replaced my camera with my cell phone. These photos are sheer passing instant. The pandemic struck and I was trapped inside with hundreds of these images. I put them up on the wall, and I realized that what led me to take all the photos had something in common. The sum of the images suggests or produces another image, a third and absent photograph.”

Alberto Goldenstein
Alberto Goldenstein, Conversación #11, 2020, copia tipo C
Conversación #11, 2020.
Alberto Goldenstein - Conversación-#9,-2020,-copia-tipo-C
Conversación #9, 2020.
Alberto Goldenstein, Conversación #6, 2020, copia tipo C
Conversación #6, 2020.
Alberto Goldenstein, Conversación #12, 2020, copia tipo C
Conversación #12, 2020.
Alberto Goldenstein, Conversación #2, 2020, copia tipo C
Conversación #2, 2020.
Alberto Goldenstein, Conversación #5, 2020, copia tipo C
Conversación #5, 2020.
Alberto Goldenstein, Conversación #1, 2020, copia tipo C
Conversación #1, 2020.

BIO

ALBERTO GOLDENSTEIN, b. Buenos Aires, 1951.

Photographer, teacher and curator of photography, one of the key artists working in this medium in Argentina. In 1981 Alberto Goldenstein traveled to the USA and enrolled in the New England School of Photography, Boston. In 1984 he returned to Buenos Aires, where he met Alfredo Londaibere and became acquainted with Jorge Gumier Maier and Marcelo Pombo, friendships that led him to actively participate in the art scene which developed around the Centro Cultural Rojas in the nineties. His first solo exhibition was at the Photo Gallery of Centro Cultural Recoleta in 1991. That same year he presented a show entitled Tutti Frutti at Centro Cultural Rojas, where he also started teaching photography workshops with an innovative approach, which he continued to teach for the next 25 years, being a decisive influence in the development of photography in Argentina. During the first half of the nineties he worked on the Mundo del Arte (Art World) series which he exhibited at Teatro San Martín in 1997.

Spearheaded by Goldenstein, the Photo Gallery of Centro Cultural Rojas opened in 1995, he was its curator until 2019. In 1997 he participated in Tao del Arte, an iconic exhibition about the nineties in Argentina. In 2001 he produced his Mar del Plata project which was shown at Casa de Americas in Madrid that same year, and was included in many other exhibitions, among them Tres Miradas sobre Mar del Plata, currently on view at Museo de Arte Contemporáneo MAR, curated by Andres Duprat, Director of the National Museum of Fine Arts. Several books on his work have been published, including “Goldenstein” from art publisher Adriana Hidalgo with essays by Maria Gainza and Paola Cortés Rocca. In 2018 the Museum of Modern Art of Buenos Aires devoted a major retrospective exhibition to his work, curated by Carla Barbero, and published an extensive catalogue. His work has also been shown in Germany, Switzerland, Mexico, Spain, France and Tunisia.

  • Hoja de sala de la exposición El Mundo del Arte de Alberto Goldenstein, Galería de Artes Visuales del Centro Cultural Rojas, 1993
  • Hoja de sala de la exposición El Mundo del Arte de Alberto Goldenstein, Galería de Artes Visuales del Centro Cultural Rojas, 1993
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Alberto Goldenstein studio, San Telmo, Buenos Aires.
Alberto Goldenstein, Autorretrato en el Chelsea Hotel, Nueva York, 2011
Alberto Goldenstein, Self-Portrait at the Chelsea Hotel, New York, 2011.

Francisco Lemus holds a bachelor’s degree in art history from the Universidad Nacional de La Plata, and a master’s in curatorial studies and a doctorate in comparative art theory from the Universidad Nacional Tres de Febrero. His dissertation was entitled Guarangos y soñadores. La Galería del Rojas en los años noventa (Vulgarians and Dreamers: The Rojas Gallery in the Nineties). Thanks to a post-doctoral fellowship awarded by the CONICET, Lemus is doing research on the political and artistic responses to the HIV/AIDS crisis in Argentina during the post-dictatorship period. He is a professor in the History and Social Studies division of the Art Department at the Universidad de La Plata and in the Graduate Program in Gender Studies at Universidad Tres de Febrero. He has published articles in academic journals and non-specialized magazines in Argentina and abroad. The exhibitions he has curated include Imágenes seropositivas. Prácticas artísticas en torno al vih durante los años 90 (La Ene, 2017), Tácticas luminosas. Artistas mujeres en torno a la Galería del Rojas (Colección Fortabat, 2019) and y Fuera de serie. Alejandra Seeber/Leda Catunda (Paralelo 1||3, MALBA, 2021).

Related content

  • Orgullo Y Prejuicio

    Chapter I:
    Introduction

  • Alberto Goldenstein: La materia entre los bordes. Fotografías 1982-2018

    Exhibition catalogue from the exhibition at the Museo Moderno, Bs. As., 2018

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  • Tres miradas sobre Mar del Plata

    Catalogue of the exhibition at the Museo MAR, 2020

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