Fifth annual Robert Rosenblum Lecture
Miriam Basilio: "Ritual and Spectacle in Franco's Regime"

Although we are familiar with Pablo Picasso's Guernica (1937) and imagery of the Spanish Civil War, the propaganda of Francisco Franco's regime is still largely unknown. Majestic portraits and posters of the dictator drew on Spanish baroque painting, modern photography, and contemporary advertising. Museums and exhibitions were staged as sites of ritual, spectacle, and national tourism, practices at times indebted to the arts of Fascist Italy under Benito Mussolini. This lecture will consider the art and culture—and its context—of Franco's Spain. 

Miriam M. Basilio is Associate Professor of Art History and Museum Studies at New York University. Her research focuses on visual and exhibition cultures, propaganda, and the history of exhibitions of Spanish and Latin American art. Her book Visual Propaganda, Exhibitions, and the Spanish Civil Warwas published by Ashgate in 2013. Basilio served as a curator for the exhibition MoMA at El Museo: Latin American and Caribbean Art from the Collection of The Museum of Modern Art (2003).