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From its inception, art history has been particularly concerned with artists and the moment in which they bring artworks into being. Although in recent years historians of colonial Latin American art have, by necessity, done vital work to expand the kind of creators and objects they discuss, the field has largely remained organized around the idea that artworks are created via a punctual act that begins and ends within the artist's studio. Such a restrictive view of creation, which is rooted within the history of western art, prevents us from capturing different modes of making.

This roundtable seeks to reimagine the boundaries of the very idea of creation to be more capacious. In particular, we seek to facilitate a conversation about examples of ongoing or continual creation, many of which were performed by Indigenous and Black people (either as individuals or collectives) across colonial Latin America. Potential topics for the roundtable might include but are not limited to: Indigenous or African concepts that trouble the idea of a single punctual act of creation, the constant modification of miraculous imagery, or durable relationships between communities– such as confraternities– and artworks that reshaped the artwork over time. We welcome other contributions that would creatively expand the definition of continual creation to help write new and more inclusive histories of colonial Latin American art.