From the editor.

• Author: Kiernan, James Patrick

An exaggeration to be sure, but there is some validity to Frederick Barnard's contention that "one picture is worth ten thousand words." Visual imagery grabs our attention with an immediacy and force that words can only hope to accumulate. In this issue of Americas, we look at different ways imagery is used, and to what effect.

In his interview with editors Alberto Ruy Sanchez and Margarita de Orellana, Caleb Bach demonstrates how their publication, Artes de Mexico, rich in aesthetic imagery of all art forms--textiles, pottery, woodcarving, and painting--brings an egalitarian attitude to its exploration of Mexican arts. Celeste Mackenzie describes how Guatemalan photographer Daniel Hernandez Salazar uses the imagery of the assassinated, thereby creating a swell of public awareness about the dead and disappeared in his country's long civil conflict. Maria Alejandra Gutierrez explains how the new Argentine cinema draws on the economic conditions in the streets, using both professional and amateur actors and simple narratives to portray a world of adversity, yet ultimately, of hope.

A Hobson's choice is also present in Toby Fenton's story of the excavation and development of the ancient and isolated Inca city of Choquequirao, which the...