Three years of experience already endorse our young visual arts magazine. This issue inaugurates a new cycle; opening new perspectives in the publishing business that we trust will place us at the center of the international limelight, due both to the value of its content, and the makeover of its image and conception. The management team of Art by Excellence faces its fourth year with a cardinal purpose: rearticulate topics and issues addressed previously by the publication in order to provide new perspectives on the Art market of the Americas; private and institutional collectors, regional event organization associated with the visual arts world, and the promotion of the region’s most noteworthy artists, among others.

Contemporary art which is produced today in the Caribbean and Central American contexts in recent years has mutated favorably, as a result of which many artists from these regions participate more frequently in relevant global events, while local institutions related not only with art, but also with architecture and design, have been growing from within.

That is why the magazine, at all levels, seeks to respond to such an exhilarating panorama. In this sense, this issue includes texts which reflect on the Caribbean and Central America; from an interview with one of the most experienced regional experts, to a critical review of the works of Manuel Mendive, Pepón Osorio and Manuel Lopez Oliva, creators that truly represent the singularities of these contexts. Architecture, in turn, manifests itself through an exhaustive journey through a noted historian’s region, prolific in generalities and details. The Havana Biennial, since its foundation in 1984, is a paradigmatic event of the region and of the international art circuit, which will be having its eleventh edition this year, to which Art by Excellence in future issues will offer a critical review of its curatorial platform and exhibition program. Other unique events are also discussed, such as Art Basel Miami Beach, considered by many the best visual arts fair of the continent, as well as PINTA NY, devoted entirely to Latin American production.

The complex Latin American scenario is represented through an analysis of art and politics, specifically of the case of Guatemala, and further on into the Mercosur block of countries. Space is dedicated to that great universal artist, the Chilean Roberto Matta, as well as to the curious opening of a Cuban Art Museum in the heart of Old Europe. Finally, an interesting point of view on the proliferation of art catalogs in contemporary cultural scene, and a page dedicated to the art of comics. With all this, we sincerely hope, to present a renewed publication that with each edition aspires to contribute to a better and deeper understanding of our complex cultural realities.

José Carlos de Santiago / Publisher