The ninth issue of Arte por Excelencias is stressing on Argentina’s plastic arts, in boldface names who have contributed greatly to their conceptual and abstract creations; it also delves into Mexico’s architecture and offers an insight look into graphic design and installation art in Cuba. Tradition and contemporariness, reaffirmation and rupture are shown as articulation values in the works penned by Argentine expert Margarita Sanchez on fellow countrywoman Dolores Caceres, as well as Maria Jose Herrera’s piece on painters Eduardo Costa, Horacio Zabala and Marcelo Boullosa. Eduardo Luis, a maven on regional architecture, underscores the qualities and contributions in the work of Mexico’s Luis Barragan. Another highlight in this issue is Benjamin Brown’s essay featuring a detailed appraisal of outstanding Cuban artist Alexandre Arrechea’s work and Píter Ortega helps to unravel the idea-esthetic codes in the Tipped Wings project. The suggestive treatise written by art critic and curator Adriana Almada on British-Argentine painter Sara Hopper’s visceral eroticism is just another standout, and so are Abelardo Mena’s in-depth interview with American collector Howard Farber and the sarcastic caricature offered by Peru’s Juan Acevedo in which he lays bares his assortment of approaches and outlooks toward countries from the Americas and the Caribbean. We pay tribute in this issue to a friend, an exceptional essayist and art critic, the late Rufo Caballero. His ideas and recommendations are a member of our magazine’s publishing council, coupled with his acute assessments he made in his “All by Oneself” column were significantly important for the development and strengthening of Arte por Excelencias during these two years of work.

José Carlos de Santiago Publisher