For those interested in street art, Latin American cities offer a rich history of diverse artistic expressions in public spaces. Although not monolithic by any means, regional dynamics of shared practices and experiences can be traced, including the Mexican muralism of the 1940s that inspired artists to engage directly with the public, the political slogans of the 1960s that continue to accompany protests, the hip-hop and football barra graffiti writers adapting global subcultures to reflect their local realities and the street artists offering playful socio-political critiques. In Democracy on the Wall, Guisela Latorre explores this variety in Chile's dynamic street-art scene. While the history of grassroots arts practice is important, particularly the political mural brigadas supporting Salvador Allende's presidency, street art really explodes at the end of Augusto Pinochet's dictatorship. This is unsurprising, given the gradual loosening of control over artistic expressions in the transition to democracy. However, Latorre focuses on the post-dictatorship period not to mark a shift but to understand the ‘continuing cultural and institutional legacy of the military regime’ (p. 7).

Each case study of graffiti and muralism reveals artists’ critiques of ongoing social inequalities, the dominance of the neoliberal model and the corruption of government and corporate elites that mark everyday life and the urban landscape. Latorre argues that such critiques are revealed not simply in the content of street art but in its praxis, and that, in voicing such critiques, the artists are ‘enacting […] a visual democracy’ (p. 4). By this she means that they are participating in the project of ‘democracy to come’, taken from Jacques Derrida, by simultaneously highlighting the failures of the democratic transition while trying to formulate alternative social relations. This framework is particularly useful for explaining the nuanced politics of painting in the street and is strengthened by the author's thoughtful visual analysis of street art that complements her oral-history interviews with artists.

The muralism of the Ramona Parra and Chacón brigades described in Chapter 1 provides the most explicit example of the relationship between political activism and public art. The Brigada Ramona Parra opts for a simplicity of style, with bold outlines, iconic left-wing symbols and a replicability that encourages reproduction, while the Brigada Chacón produces papelógrafos, text-based political commentaries printed on streams of paper and then pasted in public spaces. Both, however, are continuing the legacy of militant art-making, whereby their recognisable style and iconography are embedded in their political messages of denunciation, mobilising political engagement within the community and promoting social justice. In Chapter 2, the spatial politics of inequality frame the analysis of street art. Latorre explores museos a cielo abierto (open-air museums) and their attempts to counteract urban marginalisation by beautifying poblaciones (neighbourhoods) and producing large-scale murals in collaboration with the local community. Again, the legacy of the dictatorship is important, as the act of painting these neighbourhoods revalorises the working-class communities who suffered under Pinochet and continue to suffer in the contemporary neoliberal context of private-sector control in urban management. Alongside their style and location, though, the content of the murals analysed in both chapters is also significant and the themes reflect deep-rooted social issues, including the demand for free education, the rights of Indigenous groups and the regional history of activism and repression.

In Chapter 3, Latorre reveals a further tension embedded in Chilean society. Graffiti-writing aesthetics are often associated with individual appropriations of public space, criticised by some as reinforcing a neoliberal individualist agenda through the desire for fame and notoriety. However, the act of tagging is also a way of claiming public spaces from which social groups are often excluded and of ‘demanding visibility amidst the dehumanizing and deadening anonymity imposed by the city’ (p. 122). Furthermore, Latorre points out that there is a strong network of collaboration, solidarity and mentorship within the subculture. Such an analysis points to the implicit politics of street art, moving away from direct messages and towards the politics of self-expression and sociality to counteract forms of exclusion. In Chapter 4, this line of argument continues with a close analysis of gender politics both within the world of street art and in society more broadly. Notably, it is the artists who make the case for a political reading of their work, which explicitly celebrates femininity even if, as Latorre points out, it conforms to somewhat stereotypical imagery. Their aim is to subvert patriarchal assumptions about gendered roles by reclaiming masculine public spaces and insisting that women are out on the streets, expressing themselves.

The limitations of these art forms in enacting a visual democracy are also significant, as shown in great detail through the analysis of women artists and their frustrations with the invisibility of women in street art. However, there are other moments that merit further attention, including the dissenting opinions within the brigadas regarding their affiliation with political parties that suggest disenchantment with institutional politics, and the subtle aesthetic hierarchy implied when graffiti artists are unconcerned by increasing signs of restriction in public space, because it will only affect the taggers. Tying together these moments of discord might have offered a more nuanced reading of the relationship between street art and democratic ideals, not least because they signal the complexities and contradictions embedded within the notion of democracy and raise the important question of who is included in the project of ‘democracy to come’.

Overall, though, the book makes a persuasive argument for appreciating street art's insights into visual culture, urban space and political activity, not to mention the array of socio-political issues that they articulate. That they are situated within a transnational framework in the final chapter consolidates Latorre's aim of promoting Chilean street art and the lessons to be learnt from it, which she puts into practice by detailing the visits of two Chilean street artists to the United States and the collaborative workshops that they offered. In doing so, she makes a strong contribution to the literature on street art in Latin America, while also suggesting new methodologies for incorporating its participatory praxis.