Rafael Ferrer c. 1969. Photograph courtesy Da Wire

When a critic referred to his style as “faux primitivism,” Ferrer objected that the characterisation was based on a prejudice about the people he depicted rather than on his way of painting them. “They can call the people in the paintings natives or they can call them inhabitants of this place or the other, but I call them neighbours.”

Actually, some of the first paintings Ferrer made after his return to the medium do betray a certain primitivism. I’m thinking of works like El Cuarteto (The Quartet) or Melida la Reina (Melida the Queen), both from 1981, which almost seem like elaborations of his paper-bag mask fantasies. But by mid-decade his style had become distinctly more sophisticated, settling into a sturdy Modernism that would not have looked outrageous to any of Ferrer’s early twentieth-century heroes but with a personal inflection that could never be confused with anyone else’s. Ferrer’s brush is tough, unsentimental; he prefers to show things bluntly rather than suavely coaxing them into visibility. His pictorial space can seem almost hammered into place — as if an imprint of his work as a sculptor. His use of the word “neighbours” to describe his subjects is quite precise. In painting the people who lived near him in the Dominican Republic, he was painting neither familiars — it is telling that although Ferrer has done self-portraits, he has rarely painted his family or close friends — nor complete strangers. Wariness and curiosity register in the faces of many of Ferrer’s subjects, although others appear more ingenuous. There is no false familiarity here, but rather a distance to be negotiated. And it can be negotiated.

— Barry Schwabsky reviews Retro/Active, a retrospective of work by the Puerto Rican artist Rafael Ferrer at El Museo del Barrio, in the September 13 Nation. The exhibition, curated by Deborah Cullen, opened in June and closed on 22 August.

Junot Díaz

Junot Díaz: I have to tell you something: when I was young, I read Moby Dick and I always thought, “There is no English like this in the world.” It was a book that contained twenty-five Englishes. And I was like, “Could I write a book that contained every single one of the languages I could speak fluently, or at least that I was aware of?” So that was a dream, too.

Guernica: You’re a great talker. I’ve heard you give talks and on the radio. You’re a naturally good talker. Do you think being a good talker is also part of being a good writer? Or did one come first? Were you a better writer, then a better oral speaker? Can you talk about that?

Junot Díaz: I guess it depends on who you ask. I would actually say that part of it is practice. In general, I’m actually pretty darn awkward. I guess I’m not a Caribbean person whose spoken language has always been kind of our playground. I never was one of those people who had the gift of gab, as they say. I’m not sure the two connect. I have friends who are incredible raconteurs. They tell tremendous stories. I mean, I can listen to the writer Francisco Goldman tell stories all day. But I’m terrible at telling stories, man. I’m telling you. I do better when I’m on the page.

— From an interview with Díaz by Adriana Lopez, in the July 2009 issue of Guernica; in which the Dominican-American writer discusses the origins of the name “Oscar Wao”, the role of the body in Caribbean culture, his favourite character from a book, and what he would be if he weren’t a writer:

Knowing me, I would probably be a lawyer. I’m really into our community, I’m really into the rights of immigrants, the rights of the working poor. I’m one of those little activist types. I probably would have just gone to law school.