The scale and classicism with which Berni treated this scene of a soccer team from the outskirts of Buenos Aires lend the painting a sense of grandeur. Depicting the mixed racial heritages of the young players, the work gestures toward the idea of Pan-Americanism prevalent at the time: the belief in shared cultural, economic, and historical bonds between North and South America.
Gallery label from Lincoln Kirstein’s Modern, March 17 – June 15, 2019.