I have often pondered on the role that art should play in today's world, in view of factors which I believe may either enhance or prevent its development. The issue is quite complex, and even to begin addressing it would require more time. We can, however, start to approach it by reflecting on some aspects of the question, on today's view of universal art particularly. We are used to referring exclusively to art produced in industrialised countries when we speak of "contemporary art." This comes from the industry's strength in disseminating its images, which become "universal" at the very speed their media permit. You can, of course, always find vast amounts of informative material on this contemporary art production at every international art event, in books, magazines and essays. These European or American publications always address the same issues, however_namely, works of art produced and exhibited in the Developed World, and more specifically that of its towns that have succeeded in becoming the basic power centres of the art world. I used to find practically no publications at all on the contemporary art forms produced in other regions at the beginning of the 1980s. But time has passed and the situation has changed somewhat. I have succeeded in accumulating data on Third World artists and have also found changed attitudes in certain European art milieus. At least, I think I have sometimes found significant signs of interest in works of art being produced today in "developing countries" (a definition consistently applied to all ways of life there). People are beginning to recognise that economic poverty does not necessarily imply a paucity of intellectual resources, and they are starting to accept the existence of original creativity, developing an attitude of real and proper professional interest rather than mere curiosity. Despite this, however, I am not certain that today's situation is in relative terms any different from that which existed when years ago I started to look for information on current Third World art, not just for knowing of works of art but mostly for really understanding and enjoying them. Examinations in many universities continue to class what is seen in the "West" as "universal" contemporary art, and museums continue to exhibit works by artists in this manner, believing that they summarise the spirit of our times. Latin American and African artists do sometimes appear in international exhibitions, but museums seem to present this production in order to display their open-mindedness, rather than out of conviction. I believe that the knowledge of international contemporary art is still limited and restricted to what is shown in structured circles, organised to consecrate a certain type of art, despite any appearance of progressiveness. Independent of this, reality will prevail; to continue ignoring the existence of different worlds whose presence on our planet can no longer be underestimated will be extremely difficult. We must at least be proud that the intention to respect contextual peculiarities in art, and the conviction that no one culture is better than any other one, are becoming progressively accepted. These albeit isolated expressions offer some hope as to the necessary ethical changes we need for the world we live in, where marginalization, xenophobia, and the prevalence of brawn over brain are becoming dangerously predominant. The post-modern commitment to defend differences and respect the peculiarities of different contexts has undoubtedly contributed to a better understanding of the diversities of today's world, but we must recognise the existence of issues that are no longer the exclusive domain of any one region of the hemisphere. These problems have an ethical base and their expressions differ according to the surrounding environment, but they have a common origin and are fast becoming universal concerns. Marginalization is one. Racial or sexual discrimination and immigration are problems in every country. What allows contemporary society to accept it all so passively? These events do not pass by unobserved in art, however, and are analysed by artists in the USA, Canada, South Africa and the Arab world alike. These topics can be seen addressed both at Kassel's Documenta and the Havana Biennial, though from different points of view and in different languages. What separates the works of a South African artist like Sue Williamson from those by Adrian Piper from the U.S., or Palestinian Mona Hatoum's from those by Vera Frankel, a Czech residing in Canada? They all reflect this era's way of feeling, in my view. This important factor unites them all and is reflected by their contemporaneity in both concept and language. I have, however, heard several top level European critics, friends of mine, state that they were uninterested in Third World art, as it is closer to sociology and anthropology than to art per se. I fail to understand what prevents them from seeing the world in its globality and appreciating the differences. Further definition of art's nature and concepts, limits and frontiers, might help. Can we go to the extreme of establishing polarisation between sociology and art for art's sake, or can we consider works of art in all their possible ranges and extensions and attribute to them the humanistic meaning they deserve? I believe that artists have the right to penetrate their own realities in absolute freedom, both by experimenting in languages and by considering the contexts in which they live. We must not start from an idea of polarised or close-knit art and demand that artists produce anything beyond their own choosing. A effort should be made to clarify what goes on globally in art. We are faced with a great diversity of art centres_it would be useless to deny or ignore this, but I must admit that developing a complete picture of what goes on in art world-wide is really difficult. We have many means available to learn about what goes on in Europe and North America, where the leading art magazines are published, the most prestigious museums are located, and the most renowned events take place, but what can we do to learn about Third World artists? Save for rare exceptions, there are no contemporary art museums in their countries that can afford to collect works by their national, let alone regional or provincial, artists. We certainly cannot count on a system of attractive, internationally-distributed magazines to "sell" their products. Commercial activity has only just begun for these artists, but a demand for the work which would be capable of supporting its development is non-existent. Learning what the artists of these countries are doing is thus very difficult. We must travel extensively, go and visit them, enter their studios, talk with them, hear what they think and to penetrate a world without the means to make itself known. What resources do poor countries have to divulge their production? What means do Third World artists have to make their works appreciated? No one is afraid of being called an ignoramus for lack of knowledge of Third World art, but the really serious thing is that this lack of knowledge often leads to unprofessional attitudes versus a reality that is still very little or only superficially known. Statements based on misunderstandings are easy to make when one is labouring under the illusion of having already understood everything. We shall certainly make a step forward in favour of culture when we recognise the existence of a unknown and misunderstood art. Though there are great differences among Third World countries, there undoubtedly are a great number of artists who work hard, whose spirituality is not destroyed in spite of the environmental decay surrounding them. On the other hand, the poverty around them leads an increasing number of artists_like many other sectors of our peoples in quest of a "Promised Land"_to migrate as minorities to richer lands. These artists carry with them the specific problems of the Third World; when they move to highly developed countries, their works express some of these issues together with the new problems caused by their relationship to their new context. They sometimes succeed in penetrating and integrating with the system, and then come to be considered part of their new country's national art, which is also considered "universal". This is more difficult for others who simply may not want to integrate deeply. Many of them, whether resident or not in their new countries, have contributed greatly to developing a new awareness of the great social unbalances of today's world, and towards a new dimension of international contemporary art. I believe the world situation can be understood by the contents on a critic's or museum director's desk. The point is that you always find the same publications on these desks, whatever continent you may be in. These people travel round the world to bear witness of what goes on in art "internationally". The rate at which this information travels seems fantastic to me, but that it projects a really limited image of the world is also rather worrying. The view of art that you get from the critics, curators and publications is almost exclusively limited to what is on show in Europe and the USA. No other reality besides what the media have to communicate can be perceived because of the centralised resources this part of the world uses. You always find the same names in catalogues, magazines, and papers, and they all come from the same places. You would have to find other, far more costly channels to satisfy your curiosity to know what's going on elsewhere. Years ago I decided to find out what was going on in countries about which the only thing I knew was that they were in a state of perpetual famine, or at war, or that they had been the cradle of extraordinary civilisations thousands of years before. The situation was somewhat complex at the time. My studies for graduating in Art History had not given me much of a wider perspective than any other European student may have received. In addition to North American art, our curriculum included an exam on contemporary art that only covered the study of contemporary manifestations of European art in my country, located in the very centre of the Third World, starting from its contributions to abstraction, as well the study of some Japanese architects. As for Asia, Africa and the Middle East, we went no further than studying events tied to their historical traditions. Art seemed to have closed there with millennial expressions or folklore. True, many expectations on contemporary Latin American art could be satisfied; we were quite up to date with what went on in most of these counties, but their art was studied separately, without explanation of their interrelationships to what went on in the rest of the world. Contemporary art had no surname, it was implicitly European, "Western", and thus "Universal", but it excluded Latin America. When trying to satisfy my curiosity on the production of art by peoples who represented the historical continuity of those who created great civilisations, I consulted all the existing bibliographies_international art magazines, catalogues of great exhibitions... and thus found that I had to travel. Art cannot remain on the fringes of the artistic creation of peoples, as all those who live on earth are first actors of transcendental moments in which the expression of art is recurrent. The present requires radical changes of attitude, such as to lead to nobler ethical relationships to ensure the survival of mankind. Llilian Llanes Havana, December 1992

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