Chilean Communist Visual Arts in the face of Socialist Realism during the early Cold War (1948-1952)

this article studies the reception of socialist realism in the platforms of the Chilean Communist Party (PCCh) during the years of the anti-communist persecution unleashed by Gabriel Gonzalez Videla (1948-1952). More specifically, its objective is to elucidate the encounters and disagreements between the plastic culture of the PCCh and this artistic doctrine, which reached its most dogmatic formulation precisely in the context of the early Cold War. For this purpose, we study the practices of the visual artists who were consecrated in the heart of Chilean communist culture between the late forties and early fifties through the discourses of art (reflections, debates and criticisms) that circulated in the PCCh media at that time. This will allow us to verify the assimilation of certain prescriptions of socialist realism in the PCCh circuits, without losing sight of the "localist" inclinations of Chilean communist art or the problems associated with the very exportability of socialist realism.