The Future of Utopia

Unlike well-known films such as Tiré Dié (1959-1960) or Los Inundados (1961) which centered on social and political issues, Birri’s paintings only occasionally engage with contemporary political events. His visual work from this period turns instead toward spiritual, sexual and philosophical transformation.

In works like Le Sexe au Pouvoir (1978), this shift becomes especially vivid, suggesting the body, desire and eroticism as new sites of liberation. The text in the painting, for instance, appears to allude to Guanyin, the Buddhist bodhisattva of compassion—sometimes invoked as a Queer icon for her gender fluidity and healing presence. However, there are specific and rare cases, such as Falce e Martello. Los Tiranos También Mueren (F.F.) [Francisco Franco] (1975) which references historical events like the death of the Spanish dictator Francisco Franco. In another case, for instance, Birri spreads ink resembling a bloodstain across the pages of a contemporary newspaper that refers to the war between Israel and Lebanon (L’Ineffabile Quotidiano, 1978).

As filmmaker Humberto Ríos recalled after meeting Birri in 1973, there was already a sense of distance—or even disillusionment—with the utopian promises of the Latin American revolution. ¹ The absence of overt political imagery in Birri’s art remains an open question, but it may reflect the artist’s belief in transformation through other, perhaps more intimate, forms of expression and resistance.