The Latino Christ in Art, Literature, and Liberation Theology

This exploration of Iberian, Latin American, and US-Hispanic representations of Christ focuses on outliers in art, literature, and theology: Spanish painter Salvador Dali, Mexican muralist Jose Clemente Orozco, Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges, Spanish existentialist Miguel de Unamuno, Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff, and Mexican philosopher Jose Vasconcelos, some of the most brilliant stars in the Spanish and Latin American firmament. Their work, and that of others, stands out from the conventional and the traditional, stretching our imagination by opening our eyes to what we do not want to see.

The author also reflects on such significant lesser-known writers as New Mexican author, painter, and priest Fray Angelico Chavez; Argentine writer and political leader Ricardo Rojas, author of The Invisible Christ; Mexican American theologian Virgilio Elizondo; and Chicana feminist Gloria Anzaldua, author of Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza. He shows how artists project their concerns onto representations of Christ and how the perceptions of the reader and viewer reflect their culture and their psychology. Along the way, Candelaria explores the philosophical issues of representation in aesthetics and the problems of hermeneutics and identity.