SOLAS Interviews Explore Student Research

February 4, 2014

The Student Organization for Latin American Studies (SOLAS) continues to develop innovative, horizontal methods of sharing research among graduate students across the UNM campus and beyond. The latest approach involves conducting one-on-one interviews with students whose research pertains to Latin America. The first interview features Annick Benavides, who recently received her Master's degree from the UNM Department of Art & Art History.

SOLAS coordinator Jeremy Falson sat down with Annick on February 05, 2014, to discuss her research as part of an interview titled "Cusco School Defense of the Eucharist: A Tribute to the Tinku." In short, the interview explores how the defense of the Eucharist paintings portrays an eternal conflict - that between Spanish monarch and non-believers, but more importantly, that between balanced and complementary opponents. Defense paintings ultimately honor the reciprocity between idolatry and orthodox religion, and they owe their inception to the unique circumstances of viceregal Peru. The invention of the iconography can be attributed to an Andean affinity for understanding triumph as the coming together of festive, complementary opponents. Colonial dictionaries describe tinku (tinkuy) and its many linguistic permutations, both in Quechua and Aymara, as a place of union where two opposing yet complementary forces have come together to form something new and powerful.

The interview with Annick is intended to be the first of many. To hear it, as well as to access other research articles written by UNM Latin Americanist students, visit the SOLAS website.

SOLAS is the Student Organization for Latin American Studies at the University of New Mexico. The organization represents both undergraduate and graduate students pursuing degrees in Latin American studies as well as those conducting research in the region. By recording interviews with students across campus, SOLAS furthers its mission to increase awareness about Latin American issues and cultural happenings through the facilitation of intellectual dialoge.