Asociación Amigos del Arte

The Argentine art gallery Asociación Amigos del Arte (Friends of Art Association), a collective established by elites in Buenos Aires, fostered a vibrant community of native and international artists, critics, intellectuals, and collectors. Under the leadership of longtime president Elena “Bebe” Sansinena de Elizalde (1883–1970), the organization became an indispensable cultural venue in Argentina and a model for other galleries there.

Socialite Adelia Acevedo founded Asociación Amigos del Arte in 1922 during the presidency of Marcelo Torcuato de Alvear (1922–28), amid Buenos Aires’s rapid urbanization. Elizalde assumed leadership of the organization two years later. A statute signed on June 15, 1924, at Elizalde’s residence, stipulated that the gallery’s structure would include a diverse board of directors and six subcommittees overseeing literature, painting, sculpture, decorative arts, music, public outreach, and publications. In 1927 the gallery relocated from its initial location on Calle Florida 940 to Florida 659 in downtown Buenos Aires.

During the two decades of its existence, the gallery hosted an impressive array of events, including five hundred art exhibitions, three hundred conferences, three hundred concerts, and fifteen theatrical performances. Its diverse exhibition program ranged from monographic and historical displays of colonial, pre-Columbian, and ancient art to presentations of modern art, organized thematically and stylistically. A key mission was the exhibition of private art collections. The inaugural exhibition of this type, in 1924, featured the holdings of Francisco Llobet, a prominent board member who had amassed a significant collection of nineteenth-century French art, including sculptures by Rodin,and Chinese pottery. Otherswho exhibited their collections included Alfredo González Garaño, Oliverio Girondo, Ignacio Pirovan, Gustavo Pueyrredón, and Antonio Santamarina. Amigos del Arte was also instrumental in displaying the work of emerging Argentine artists such as Antonio Berni, Cesáreo Bernaldo de Quirós, Ernesto de la Cárcova, Víctor Cúnsolo, Juan Del Prete, Fernando Fader, Pedro Figari, Raquel Forner, Ramón Gómez Cornet, Alfredo Guttero, Emilio Pettoruti, Benito Quinquela Martín, Raúl Soldi, and Xul Solar, among others.

In 1926, Victoria Ocampo, a socialite, writer, art advocate, and publisher of the literary magazine Sur, joined as board member. Together, Elizalde and Ocampo expanded Amigos del Arte’sprogramming. They organized lectures by notable native and international artists, authors, and philosophers such as Waldo Frank, Federico García Lorca, Ramón Gómez de la Serna, Pedro Henríquez Ureña, Hermann Keyserling, Le Corbusier, Filippo Tomasso Marinetti, Maria Montessori, Alfonso Reyes, David Alfaro Siqueiros, and the Spanish philosopher and essayist José Ortega y Gasset, who in 1929 presented his book The Revolt of the Masses. They also expanded its offerings to literary and book illustration competitions; avant-garde theater, jazz and tango performances; classical and folk music programs; film series; and presentations of puppets, including some designed by Victoria’s sister, the writer Silvina Ocampo. A groundbreaking move was the launch of a Cinema Club, Argentina’s first film organization, which ranfrom 1928 to 1931 and screened avant-garde and experimental films. These activities underscore the prominent role that elite women played in the cultural production of Argentina during the early twentieth century.

Revenue generated from art sales supported not only these events but also artists through direct funds, scholarships, and grants, fostering the growth of an emerging artist community and encouraging artistic exploration. The institution also undertook ambitious publication projects that includedopulent books and a collection of postcards that captured the nation’s transformation through photography.

Between 1930 and 1935, Amigos del Arte introduced retrospectives dedicated to nineteenth-century artists, the first of their kind in Argentina, along with group exhibitions of work by contemporary artists. These were organized both through public calls for exhibition proposals and by invitation; many of the artists featured were associated with the avant-garde journal Martín Fierro, like José Sandoval, David Alfaro Siqueiros, and Xul Solar.

Elizalde’s leadership served as a driving force behind the dynamic community cultivated at Asociación Amigos del Arte. Under her guidance, the gallery flourished until its closure in 1942.