Cerrado por brujería [Closed for Witchcraft]

The notion of chaos as the primary state of the universe has been an ongoing concern in Luis Felipe Noé’s art. In 1962, Noé understood chaos as a tension between opposite forces. In a bold, expressionistic style he presents a Catholic prelate in a dominant position above talking heads trapped in a black grid. As the nation’s official religion, Catholicism played a complex role in shaping Argentine society. A controversial 1963 law assigned the Church the function of rating plays and films for the Argentine public. The red cross here is an ambiguous symbol, offering comfort to the alienated while enforcing through censorship officially sanctioned Western and Christian values.