SANTIAGO, Chile — Within the late Eighties, the Chilean indie band María Sonora recorded an album that existed extra as rumor than truth. Helmed by brother and sister duo Sebastián “Tan” Levine and María José Levine, the group was recognized for mashing collectively what was then an unconventional array of sounds: dance corridor, samba, electronica, rock guitar, a splash of Elvis. Their dwell reveals have been ebullient, with charismatic frontwoman María José donning handmade outfits crafted out of vibrant plastic. María Sonora landed like a colourful bolt of lightning throughout a darkish interval when Chile was deep into its second decade of dictatorship underneath Common Augusto Pinochet.
Throughout that point, the band recorded a studio album, however, like many edgier acts, they have been unable to safe industrial launch. So, María Sonora did what any underground act would do throughout that period: they distributed their music themselves on a restricted variety of homegrown cassettes. This meant that if you happen to didn’t know the band, or somebody who knew them, good luck finding their album.
Till now, that’s. Almost 4 many years after they got here collectively, their self-titled debut, María Sonora, has lastly been formally launched — an occasion marked by their first dwell gig in 31 years. Held on the Centro Cultural Gabriela Mistral (GAM) in Santiago in late October, the sold-out present drew followers to a dim basement gallery the place Tan, decked out in a tie-dye blazer behind his drum equipment, greeted the gang with a cry of “María Sonora — 35 years later!” earlier than launching into the buoyant opening riffs of a calypso-tinged tune referred to as “Zandunga.”
María Sonora reunites on stage after 31 years on October 24, 2025, on the Centro Cultural Gabriel Mistral (GAM) in Santiago, Chile; Sebastián “Tan” Levine on drums and María José Levine on vocals (picture Carolina A. Miranda/Hyperallergic)
This very belated launch came about because of a long-running aspect mission by artist Iván Navarro. Born in Chile and primarily based in New York, Navarro is finest recognized for creating sculptures out of neon and mirrors that toy with phantasm and the ambiguities of language. (One work from 2014 consists of a large drum that seems to point out the phrase “bomb” receding into infinity — an expression that might be learn as a risk, innocent slang, or an onomatopoetic interpretation of a musical beat.) In 2005, the artist, who has created quite a few works impressed by music and instrumentation, launched Hueso Data, a diminutive label dedicated to releasing restricted version recordings of sound artwork works and different area of interest tasks. “It’s a way to do public art,” he advised Hyperallergic. “It’s putting art projects not in museums, nor in galleries, but in other more popular channels, like record stores or a radio station or the internet.”
The label’s first launch, in 2005, was Roquerío by Christian Torres-Roje, a Chilean vocalist who goes by the title Nutria NN. It was a modest enterprise — a restricted run of 500 CDs — however it led to others in the same vein, small acts that always had a hyperlink to the artwork world. 5 years later, Hueso began releasing albums on vinyl.
An album cowl for a 2024 self-titled launch by the Chilean all-woman band Cleopatras options cowl artwork titled “Dialogue with White Pig” (2001) by Argentine artist Liliana Porter. This album marks the primary collaboration between ISLAA and Hueso Data. (picture courtesy Hueso Data)
The label additionally turned a manner for Navarro to discover under-documented corners of Chilean music. He started connecting with a few of the underground bands that had captivated him as teen: fringe teams whose music had arrived in his fingers not encased in shiny sleeves, however as bootleg cassettes — for the reason that dictatorship made unattainable the free circulation of something which may appear even remotely anti-authoritarian, particularly punk rock. Navarro remembers safekeeping elusive cassettes for ’80s punk acts like Los KK, in addition to the infamous Pinochet Boys, for which Tan of María Sonora additionally performed drums. (Their irreverent lyrics included: “Music for the general/Music for the general/Son of a bitch.”) Usually, tapes have been tinny from repeat copying, which, mentioned Navarro, gave the sound “an interesting texture.”
In 2012, Hueso launched the one two studio tracks ever recorded by the Pinochet Boys. The document offered out, was re-released in 2021, and has since offered out once more. Different recordings adopted, together with a dwell album by experimental rockers Electrodómesticos, in addition to a re-release of an early album by Pequeño Vicio, a band that straddled the worlds of music, theater, and dance. (Two of its members went on to co-found the Grammy-winning rock band La Ley.) Unbiased music journalist Marisol García mentioned that Navarro’s label helps to doc the nation’s music and, by extension, its historical past: “It’s not just about releasing the record — it’s about the search, the investigation, the creation of an archive.”
The quilt of the 2021 re-release of Pinochet Boys (picture courtesy Hueso Data)
Now Hueso’s releases are rising in scope. In 2024, Navarro teamed up with the Institute for Research on Latin American Artwork (ISLAA) in New York Metropolis, which is aiding with funding and with finding artists whose work could be reproduced on album covers. Final 12 months, a Hueso recording by Cleopatras, an all-woman Chilean band that additionally delved into efficiency, featured cowl imagery by Argentine artist Liliana Porter — a photographic vignette depicting a porcelain figurine of a lady going through a pig. María Sonora’s album accommodates work by the late Brazilian artist Nelson Leirner, who fabricated geometric abstractions out of material and zippers; his unorthodox use of supplies pairs nicely with the band’s strategy to music. Included in these latest releases are considerate liner notes by García. (For many who don’t have a turntable, the albums are additionally out there on Spotify.)
ISLAA founder Ariel Aisiks defined that the purpose is to broaden the mission past Chile and produce an version of 24 albums by underground bands who existed all through Latin America through the period of the dictatorships (principally, the Seventies and ’80s). Navarro jokingly refers back to the sequence as “the soundtrack to Operation Condor” — the notorious marketing campaign of coordinated political repression amongst eight right-wing dictatorships in South America at the moment. Mentioned García: “My job now is to find the Cleopatras and María Sonoras of Brazil or Argentina.”
A view of Iván Navarro’s solo set up, “Penumbra,” on the Centro Cultural Gabriela Mistral (GAM) in Santiago, Chile, October 2025. Within the foreground is “The Music Room IV” (2017), made by Navarro and Courtney Smith. It’s a listening station of radical music collected by Navarro. (picture Carolina A. Miranda/Hyperallergic)
María Sonora’s a lot anticipated reunion live performance in Santiago marks the methods through which this tiny label has served as an essential bridge between Latin American music and artwork. The gig came about amid an set up of Navarro’s work titled “Penumbra” that was a part of the seventeenth Bienal de Artes Mediales de Santiago, a scrappy citywide biennial centered on new media arts. Organizing the dwell efficiency was García, who has curated a musical sequence for GAM since 2023 referred to as Interferencias, that includes site-specific performances in areas across the constructing. For Navarro, seeing all of it come collectively in his native nation — the place his father was as soon as held as a political prisoner — has been “a dream come true.”
What makes the mission particularly poignant are the methods through which Hueso is reinscribing histories suppressed by authoritarianism. Within the early years of the dictatorship, the hulking construction that homes GAM — a weathered metal constructing resembling an plane provider — functioned because the headquarters of the navy junta. Since 2010 it has served as a cultural heart. In late October, one among its galleries turned an improvised underground nightclub the place María José bounded in regards to the stage in an exuberant ensemble of sequins, tulle, and crimson fishnets, plunging into the opening traces of “Armenia,” a trumpet-laden tune bearing Arab influences. Neon sculptures by Navarro solid a crimson and inexperienced glow on the restrained gallery crowd, which, because the present wore on, was moved to bounce. It was thrilling and joyful — artwork discovering a technique to outlast those that try to suppress it.
The neon wheelbarrow sculpture that seems in Iván Navarro’s video “Linterna: No soy de aquí, Ni soy de allá” (2006). (picture Carolina A. Miranda/Hyperallergic)
The quilt of the 2016 album ¡Viva Chile! by the experimental rock act Electrodómesticos, that includes a canopy design by Pablo Castro, drawn from a historic picture by Manuel Martínez. (picture courtesy Hueso Data)
The group behind María Sonora’s comeback takes a bow. Music journalist Marisol García is seen kneeling at left. Singer María José Levine is at heart carrying crimson fishnets. Sebastián “Tan” Levine speaks into the mic. Iván Navarro is on the suitable, taking a bow in a black t-shirt with a triangle sample. (picture Carolina A. Miranda/Hyperallergic)
