ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces key discussions on the state of the arts of the global South by examining a number of cases from both theoretical and comparative perspectives. In particular, it identifies flows and counter flows: tropicalism, hybridity and bordering as defining characteristics of the arts of the South. It looks at how the Havana Biennale for Third World Art was a significant event that promoted and enacted South-to-South flows of cultural and artistic exchange since its inception in 1984, while warning of the challenges of such exchanges in the context of realigned structures of global power. Most of the global South – which for this chapter refers to Latin America (Abya Yala), the Caribbean, Africa (Alkebulan) and Southeast Asia – was transformed by modernity/coloniality, their experiences interconnected under global routes of exchange and diverse forms and processes of migration. The stories of the peoples of the South cannot be disentangled from those of the global North, as these stories refer to the building of nation-states and the participation of the people of the South in the economies, cultures and epistemic understanding of the world.
