The Toledo´s Inform: Arte, Life and Political Context in the Vision of Francisco Toledo
The series of fifteen prints Francisco Toledo made on account of Franz Kafka's Report For an Academy is the narrative line of this documentary film -directed by Albino Alvarez and produced by Germaine Gomez Haro-, that looks for the face of the juchiteco artist.
The ink with which Kafka writes the story of Pedro the Red and the aquatint of the prints of Toledo draw zigzagging outlines indefinitely searched. As the protagonist of Kafka's story (a monkey that tells the story of his metamorphosis into a man with the European Average Education to some distinguished men of the Academy of Sciences), the 'Peter the Red' in these self portrait-prints of Toledo measures a journey that takes us from Paris of the 60's to the recent teacher's conflict in Oaxaca (2006).
Thus, Toledo Report interweaves a plot where the passion and mastery of the artist and the brilliant printer, is inseparable from the chisel with which a man takes part in historical and social matters, his struggles against corruption, his strong intervention against big interests of transnationals and his memorial fights of rescue and preservation of indigenous languages, the myths and legends of the Península of Tehuantepec, México.
Francisco Toledo is considered one of the greatest Mexican alive artists with strong reputation. Born in Juchitan, Oaxaca, in 1940, his work is infused with images referring to the rich cultural tradition of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, where reality and fantasy merge in poetic metaphors of an amazing visual richness. Zapotecas legends, ancestral traditions transmitted orally from generation to generation, rituals and myths of ancient pre-Hispanic, the overwhelming sensuality of the istmeña's region are some of the recurring themes that appear in the work of Toledo, embedded with the constant references to the history of universal art of all times that the artist dominates deeply.
Toledo has done painting, printmaking, sculpture, photography, exploring the various techniques and materials in a constant search for renewal and change that has given his work a full personal and original language. Throughout his career, his artistic work has been developed in parallel with his tireless charitable work and social activism that has resulted in the creation of numerous cultural venues in Oaxaca and the direct intervention on protection of the underprivileged.
He has participated in countless national and international exhibitions, including the two major exhibitions at the Whitechapel Gallery in London and the Reina Sofia Museum in Madrid in 2001. In 2005 he received the National Award for the Arts.
The director Albino Álvarez Gómez studied film at Escuela Internacional de Cine y TV de San Antonio de los Baños, Cuba. He founded the Taller de Experimentación en Medios Audiovisuales (TEMA) of TV UNAM, México. In 1985, he won the CINED Award in the VI Festival del Nuevo Cine Latinoamericano en la Habana, Cuba, with the film Dr Atl: paisajes (1985). His documental about the sculptor Francisco Zúñiga also won this recognition. During 2005-2006 he produced Otro modo de ver, a series of 10 documentaries about contemporary art in Oaxaca, Mexico.
The producer Germaine Gomez Haro is an Art Historian, PhD candidate in Art History from the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico with the thesis "Contemporary Oaxacan Art. Between the roots and Vanguard". She is founder and Director of Advocacy and Cultural Outreach of the Casa Lamm Cultural Center.
