I am a PhD candidate in History of Art at the University of Edinburgh. My research focuses from a transnational perspective on the art of Surrealist artist Roberto Matta from the 1960s and 1970s, de-centering both geographically and chronologically the dominant narrative on the artist that has mainly focused on the 1940s, when Matta and members of the Paris Surrealist group were exiled in the United States. In Anglophone critical literature, Matta’s oeuvre has been mainly studied within this historical framework, giving little attention to the following decades when the artist became committed to different political struggles across the globe. This project aims to contribute to Matta’s scholarship by addressing his works in light of the interfaces of art and politics within the framework of revolutionary movements in Europe and Latin America in the 1960s and 1970s.
Research interests: Surrealism, 20th-Century Latin American art, Methodologies of art history
Qualifications
MA in History of Art, University College London
MA in Art History and Theory, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile
BA in English Literature and Linguistics, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile
Publications
Caro Troncoso, P. (2022), 'Between the Museum and the Street: Roberto Matta's Works in Chile during the Unidad Popular'. Bulletin of Latin American Research https://doi.org/10.1111/blar.13355
(Forthcoming) Peer-reviewed chapter: 'Transnational Encounters: Surrealism in the Caribbean in the 1940s' in The Routledge Companion to Surrealism
Research Grants & Scholarships
Becas-Chile PhD Scholarship, National Research and Development Agency (ANID), 2019-2023
Birkbeck University School Award to participate in the London Critical Theory Summer School, Birkbeck Institute for the Humanities, 2022
Postgraduate Research Expenses fund, Edinburgh College of Art, 2019-2021
Travel Grant, Association for Art History (AAH), 2021
Travel Grant, Society for Latin American Studies (SLAS), 2021
Teaching
HoA2A: Reason, Romance, Revolution: Art from 1700 to 1900 (2020-2021)
HoA2B: From Modernism and the Avant-Gardes to Postmodernism and Globalisation (2020-2021, 2021-2022)
Other academic activities
Co-convenor, 2022 Summer Symposium on Art and Activism, organised by the Association for Art History Doctoral and Early Career Research Committee
Co-convenor, Reading Group ‘Paradoxes and double-speak: responding to Howardena Pindell’s work on art world racism’ (April 2022), Howardena Pindell: A New Language Exhibition at Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh
Co-convenor, Emerging Researchers Symposium: New Themes and Ideas in Iberian and Latin American Art History (July 2021), Zurbarán Centre for Spanish and Latin American Art, Durham University
Convenor Session “Surrealism in 1960s and 1970s Latin America” (April 2021), Association for Art History (AAH) Annual Conference, University of Birmingham
Convenor Dada & Surrealism Research Group (2020-2021), Edinburgh College of Art, University of Edinburgh
