Skip to main content

Dr Luis Rebaza-Soraluz

Reader in Latin American Visual Arts

Research interests

  • Literature

Biography

Between 1975 and 1982 Luis Rebaza-Soraluz studied Science, Linguistics and Literature in the Catholic University of Peru and worked in Lima as a secondary and university teacher. He was also a publisher, editor, graphic artist and illustrator for a number of cultural publications. Since 1994 he teaches at King’s after obtaining his MA and PhD in Latin American Literature from the University of Maryland. His literary work, poetry and short fiction, has appeared in a Spanish American and US publications and has been included in the 2005 anthologies Estática doméstica: tres generaciones de cuentistas peruanos (1951-1981) and Caudal de piedra: veinte poetas peruanos (1955-1971) published by the UNAM. He has been invited to offer public lectures on Latin American art and literature by institutions such as the Hispanic Division of the Library of Congress (Washington DC), the British Museum, the MAC (Lima), and the Poet in the City organization (London).

Research Interests and PhD Supervision

Research Interests
  • Latin American poetry and poetics
  • Latin American Visual Arts
  • Vision and Visuality and the encounter of text and image in Spanish America
  • The Spanish American Fin de Siècle (1880-1920) and its perceptions of Modernity as a multidirectional process
  • Latin American modernism in literature, visual arts and architecture

Luis Rebaza-Soraluz has carried out interdisciplinary work since 1978 in the fields of poetry, the visual arts, visuality and cultural history. He has published studies on a number of Spanish American poets of the 19th and the 20th centuries. His initial research on mid-20th century modernist national and cultural identity in Peru, published in 2000, has continued with a more in-depth discussion with the analysis of the literary and visual oeuvre of Jorge Eduardo Eielson.

In 2004, Luis Rebaza-Soraluz edited an extensive anthology of Eielson’s works under the title of Arte poética. His critical edition of Eielson’s complete essays and declarations, Ceremonia comentada: Textos sobre arte, estética y cultura, has appeared in June 2010. And Ceremonia comentada: otros textos pertinentes, his edition of the critical production on Eielson’s visual work between 1948 and 2005, was published in 2013. This line of , Luis Rebaza-Soraluz’ research has expanded its scope to the so called 1930s ‘small magazines’ and modernist 1940s architecture, research published in 2017. On the other hand, his research on the field of the Spanish American Fin de Siècle has been published under themes such as ‘El viaje de Edgar A. Poe en la barca del Modernismo, y la construcción poética de Manhattan en el siglo XX.’ (1996). ‘El espectro de Calibán recorre la Hispanoamérica del Fin de Siglo’ (2004) and ‘Revancha y liberación de los monos: César Vallejo y la narrativa de la Modernidad finisecular’ (2005).

Luis Rebaza-Soraluz’ research on the visual arts includes the works of Latin American artists such as Kahlo and European ones such as the British Helen Chadwick as well as subjects such as the visual and symbolic presence of Latin American themes in European art. In collaboration with Claudio Canaparo and William Rowe, in 2001 he edited an issue of the Bulletin of Spanish Studies (University of Glasgow) dedicated to the history of Latin American Studies in the UK.

For more details, please see his full research profile.

PhD Supervision
  • Ben Bollig. ‘The Poetic Search for an Argentine Marginal Voice in the Work ofNéstor Perlongher’. (2003)
  • Nicholas Roberts. ‘The Orphic Quest: Poetry and Loss in the Work of Eugenio Montejo’. (2005)
  • Silvia Montes Garcia. ‘The Globalization of Contemporary Mexican Art’. (2013)
  • Gabriela Mejan. ‘Displacement, Permeable Boundaries and Cultural Frontiers in Comics. A Case Study on Mexican Icons’. (2013)
  • Christabelle Roca Rey. ‘Monadas and Manu Militari: Presidents and National Identity in Peruvian Visual Political Discourses (1968-1980)’. (2014)
  • Helen Melling. ‘Colourful customs and invisible traditions’: Visual Representations of Black Subjects in late colonial and 19th century, post-independence Peru’. (2015)

Teaching

Luis Rebaza-Soraluz teaches courses on Spanish American cultural history that includes poetry, narrative, essays and the visuality. He also offers courses on the Spanish American Fin de Siècle (1880-1920), Modernity, Modernism, Latin American Visual arts and Visual Culture of the 19th and 20th century.

Expertise and Public Engagement

Recent interviews:

Recent public talks and discussions:

  • [MAC] Museo de Arte Contemporáneo  (Lima, Perú) ‘Sin lenguaje, sin materia, sin cuerpo. Jorge Eduardo Eielson y la idea de un arte ilimitado’. A dialogue with Paulo César Peña. (29 April 2017) 
  • Escuela de Arte Corriente Alterna (Lima, Perú) Invited to offer the conference ‘Costa y cosmos en la obra visual de Jorge Eduardo Eielson. Un arte ultramoderno’. (2 May 2017)
  • Universidad Antonio Ruiz de Montoya (Lima, Perú)  Invited by the Escuela de Postgrado to the Round Table Vanguardias y ultramodernidades en el Perú”. (3 May 2017)
  • Universidad de Lima (Lima, Perú) Invited by the Carrera de Arquitectura to offer the conference ‘Ultramodernidades: relaciones entre la arquitectura y las artes en el Perú de mediados del siglo XX’. (4 May 2017)
  • Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú (Lima, Perú) Invited by the Maestría en Historia del Arte y Curadoría to offer the seminar ‘Cultura visual, literatura y modernidad en Hispanoamérica, 1880-1930’ (4-6 May 2017)
  • Feria Internacional del Libro & Fondo de Cultura Económica (Lima 6 August 2017) ‘Mesa redonda: Poesía, arquitectura, literatura: ultramodernos’ Discussion with the participation of researchers Paulo Dam (architect) and Luis Alvarado (musician).
  • Facultad de Arquitectura y Urbanismo of the Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú  (Lima, Peru) ‘Un metro cúbico de costa peruana: ensamblando un espacio nacional, 1940-1960’ followed by a discussion on the results of my research with the architects and researchers Paulo Dam, Sharif S. Kahatt and Luis Rodríguez Rivero (21 September 2017).
  • [MALI] Museo de Arte de Lima. (19-22 February 2018). Guest organiser ofthe Semana Eielson, a series of dialogues between the public and specialists from the fields of contemporary music, visual arts, architecture, education, film/video/performance and non objectual art, taking as a point of departure Peruvian artist/writer Jorge Eduardo Eielson’s oeuvre. These events are part of Eielson’s major retrospective exhibition in Peru (16 November 2017 - 4 March 2018).
    https://www.facebook.com/events/400646557040865/?ti=as
    http://www.mali.pe/expo_detalle.php?id=148&p=act&anio=2018

    Research

    Textual Representation PoeticsFictionRhetoric
    Textual Representation: Poetics/Fiction/Rhetoric

    Researchers within the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Culture at King’s College London are dedicated to exploring literary texts in multilingual contexts.

    Vis Culture
    Visual Culture

    The Visual Culture research group is a network of scholars within King’s College London working across a diverse historical range of film, art, and performance.

      Research

      Textual Representation PoeticsFictionRhetoric
      Textual Representation: Poetics/Fiction/Rhetoric

      Researchers within the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Culture at King’s College London are dedicated to exploring literary texts in multilingual contexts.

      Vis Culture
      Visual Culture

      The Visual Culture research group is a network of scholars within King’s College London working across a diverse historical range of film, art, and performance.