ISLAA Acquires Portion of Felipe Ehrenberg Archive

On the occasion of the upcoming exhibition Felipe Ehrenberg: Testamento, the Institute for Studies on Latin American Art (ISLAA) is delighted to announce that the artist’s estate has granted us the immense honor of repositing a portion of the Ehrenberg archive. This significant addition to our library and archive of Latin American art and artists would not be possible without the collaboration and enthusiasm of Lourdes Hernández Fuentes, the widow of Felipe Ehrenberg. ISLAA is profoundly grateful to preserve this segment of the archive, which we will handle with utmost priority and care. Major portions of Felipe Ehrenberg’s papers appear in the special collections of Stanford University Libraries in California; the Museo Universitario de Arte Contemporaneo (MUAC) at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) in Mexico City; in addition to selected material at Tate Archive, London.

Felipe meant so much, to so many, both in his native soil of Mexico and across the world, where he shaped the discourse and feeling of contemporary art on multiple continents. ISLAA understands and honors the responsibility of helping to share his inimitable legacy of neology, humor, art for all, and experimentation. 

ISLAA’s study collection exists so that scholarly communities and the broader public can engage with the rich and varied legacies of Latin American art, movements, and visual cultures. Working to make our collection accessible is core to our mission and intellectual commitments. To that end, we collaborate with research universities and museum libraries to direct scholarly attention to our special collections and inform critical research. Doing so increases access to the knowledge and richness of these materials beyond the bounds of our reading room. 

ISLAA is currently preparing to take on the ambitious and exciting project of processing an abundant volume of Ehrenberg’s materials. We are devoting resources to sorting and digitizing selected collections for unrestricted public enjoyment and study. We anticipate this work will take at least one year. Our goal is that by facilitating access to this segment of the Ehrenberg archive, ISLAA will advance vital scholarship on the artist and his endlessly inquisitive, multidisciplinary, and politically urgent practice.

Our respect for Felipe’s legacy is the thread that connects our archival activities with our exhibition program. Testamento is a retrospective and reflective assemblage of documents, photographs, writings, and drawings compiled at the very end of the artist’s decades-long career—a coda to his prodigious practice. Where the archives require intensive processing and stabilization before their contents can be made better known, the exhibition—curated by Olivia Casa—is open to the public by appointment and includes an online viewing portal that our international community can explore. Testamento is itself a mini-archive, a collection of the papers that comprise a life’s work. Ephemera are not inert things that pass through our lives; rather, our lives pass through the ephemera that we ultimately leave behind. This concept of accessing past and present courses through Testamento and informs ISLAA’s project of stewarding the Felipe Ehrenberg archive.

On the fourth anniversary of Felipe’s passing, we take this moment to reflect on the joyfulness, enthusiasm, and light of this monumental figure.