In a bizarre turn of events, this year’s Salón de Octubre — the premier art show for Jalisco-based painters — has been all but abandoned, after the majority of artists withdrew their paintings in an act of protest against the event.
Artists entered the gallery at the Ex-Convento del Carmen on Thursday, October 16 and removed their artworks from the walls, leaving gallery curators with a dilemma.
For those unfamiliar with the Salón de Octubre, it is an annual art exhibition connected with Guadalajara’s month long cultural fair, the Fiestas de Octubre. Local painters, either born or resident in Jalisco, are invited to submit their works to a judging panel, which selects the highest quality paintings for the exhibition and awards a cash prize to one overall winner.
This year’s Salón, the 36th edition, was controversial from the start when the judging panel decided to display only 19 of the 168 submitted works — far fewer than in previous years. More contentious still was their judgement that none of the submitted paintings were of a sufficient quality to receive the 60,000-peso prize. Yet despite the feeling of unease, the exhibition opened as planned on October 7, and when this newspaper visited the gallery on a couple of occasions there was a steady flow of visitors.
But with tensions perhaps fueled by the extensive coverage of the “desierto” (void) competition in the local media, a cohort of artists decided last week that enough was enough. 15 of the 19 artists whose work was on show, turned up at the Ex-Convento to remove the artworks from the gallery right there and then.
“We do not believe the jury’s decision is correct. The majority of them do not have specialized knowledge about painting,’ Mario Cinquemani, one of the artists to remove his work, told the newspaper Milenio. “We want a jury that is composed of artists, painters with a history, work experience and knowledge of the facts,” he added.
In fact, the three-person jury was comprised of a well-known Guadalajara artist, an art teacher who works regularly with students, and an art critic. Mónica Ashida Cueto of the Jalisco Culture Secretariat told the Reporter that she believes the jury had been representative of local artists and did have the qualifications to stand by this decision.
“I understand that we had a lot of talent and a lot of high quality within the works. But the judges are free to express their opinion, and when you get in a contest you know there is a possibility that they can decide not to give any prizes – or maybe they will decide to give more prizes than expected,” she said.
This year’s Salon de Octubre is far from the first contemporary arts prize to attract controversy given the subjective nature of these contests. Awards such as the Turner Prize in the United Kingdom regularly cause a significant stir as supporters and critics battle it out in the public sphere, bringing free publicity to the event and its winners.
Likewise, Ashida is well aware that the coverage surrounding this year’s prize is not necessarily a bad thing for the Salón de Octubre. “The worst thing that can happen to this kind of prize, that happens year after year, is that nobody talks about your event,” she said.
Ashida, who is an artist herself and has worked with some of the disgruntled painters, said she understands why they are angry. But she hoped that this controversy will lead to improved dialogue between the artists and the prize organizers, which will lead to significant changes in the format of the art show next year. Discussions were already underway on the day the artists removed their work, as state Culture Secretary Myriam Vachez Plagnol came to the Ex Convento to speak with the artists about why they were upset.
As for this year, the Salón de Octubre will now be replaced with the collection of local serigraphy (screen prints) that had filled the same exhibition space in September.