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Newsweek interviewed the young Chilean writer Alberto Fuguet for a May, 2002 cover story in which the author proclaimed the death of magical realism. From hereon, Latin American literature promised to drop the levitating bodies to focus on sprawling global megalopolises that strain their environments. Throw in global pop culture and you have Fuguet's McOndo, a Latin America of McDonald's, Macintosh and condos.

They're the kind of people you'll find drinking coffee in smoky cafes with paintings hanging from the wall as they wait for the open mic to start. But since no such cafes exist in Caracas, they started a magazine

Like its cousins, Caracas has grown widely and uncontrollably in the last fifty years. Shantytowns climb high up the city's hills, giving the city a distinctly improvised character. Down in the valley, the young and well-to-do drive fast cars, shop at the new El Tol€n mall, surf the web and watch cable television in several languages. But the globalized Venezuelan reality affects the poor as much as, though differently from, the rich.

Two cultural magazines have come out to address this blend of local and global culture. Dmente published its second issue last month. Although cut down to half its original size, Dmente has kept the same number of pages and improved its quality. It offers local and global cultural criticism and reporting, along with photography, as it tries to bridge the global and the local. Platanoverde, on the other hand, focuses on the local cultural environment, intent as it is on some much-needed narcissism.

"Esto no es un platano" (This is not a plantain)

Editor Jesus Ernesto Parra describes the reasons behind the name. "We wanted to refer to Magritte in the sense that this is a representation and not a real plantain. Of course it's a magazine. We also wanted to refer to Venezuelan culture because of the local resonance of plantains."

The Platanoverde crew consists of the two main editors, Hector Barboza and Enrique Aular. Supporting them are chief editor Leo Felipe Campos, editors Jesus Ernesto Parra and Jessica Bodoutchian and graphic designers Alexander Wright and MartÃn Allais. They're the kind of people you'll find drinking coffee in smoky cafes with paintings hanging from the wall as they wait for the open mic to start. But since no such cafes exist in Caracas, they started a magazine.

"As members of the third world, we are more primitive. We have lost things in development that respond to nature. Latin America preserves those things."

Platanoverde comes off like a fresh burst of energy. The magazine's apostles have designed, written, edited and compiled artistic and critical material that adds up to a stimulating romp through the city's artistic expressions. Caracas needs platanoverde like La Gran Sabana needs rain: desperately.

Platanoverde demands hard work, commitment and the need to express yourself. That's what all its contributors share, and what provided the spark that set off the fire.

"We needed to express ourselves artistically," said Barboza. "Platanoverde was born as a showcase for new artists. The youth can show their work and the older folks can see it."

Platanoverde works as a kind of tool for artists to jumpstart their creative vocations.

"We want to open a hole, so that whoever wants to can open up that hole a bit more," said Aular.

Platanoverde tells the story of young Venezuelan artists and their work. While its ambitions reach idealistic heights, the magazine's basic goal is to publish all kinds of art by young artists. Artists here desperately need to connect, and Platanoverde promises to serve as a meeting place for today's young Venezuelan artists with a global sensibility but a local focus.

"There are a lot of people, a lot of islands, so it's an issue of isolation that we try to remedy," said Jessica Bodoutchian.

Platanoverde's hefty eighty-page inaugural issue begins with an interview with Laura Stagno, a Caraque“a graduate from Caracas' Reveron Art Institute living in Tokyo. Stagno creates fascinating animation works that evoke dreams. Among the issue's other highlights, Platanoverde published transcripts from local radio shows, which offer sketches with a lot of local color. The magazine includes an interview with JosÈ Roberto Duque, local journalist and fiction writer, who writes about the city's mean streets. The magazine gives extensive space to photography and graphic design, and it offers four blank pages inviting readers to doodle and sketch. Platanoverde hopes to stimulate this creativity for its own sake, but welcomes any submissions that might result.

Dmente looks at global pop culture from a criollo perspective

Dmente seems caught between proclaiming its presence, and expecting little response from the local cultural landscape. Still, while Dmente understands the reality of its existence, their vision is nevertheless grand because its subject is.

"As members of the third world, we are more primitive," said Eric Colon Moleiro, Director and Editor of Dmente. "We have lost things in development that respond to nature. Latin America preserves those things."

That's the main motivation behind Dmente, which sees Venezuela and the region as the center of what the world needs now. Opening with a photograph of a spectacular rainbow in Merida, Colon Moleiro claims in his editorial note that Latin America's "spiritual, magical and popular sensibility turns us day by day into the world's final hope." That's what makes of Dmente a mirror for us and a window for the rest of the world.

As if to support Fuguet's claim, the new Dmente issue includes a smart essay by Tatyana Santana about the messianic Macintosh culture and its attendant cult. Boris Mu“oz pitches in with an article about the informal economy's specialized niche of used car rim vendors. Alonso Moleiro tells the story of 1960s local singer and cultural icon Cherry Navarro who died in the prime of his career. Also of note, as if to further support Fuguet's claims, the magazine gives McDonald's' new global advertising campaign an ironic twist.

Dmente and Platanoverde achieve an intelligent and critical vision of Venezuelan culture, high and low, in 2003. While Platanoverde may cover obscure experimental art, a piece about local hip hop can't be far behind. The magazines differ in that dmente offers a critical vision of global pop culture, while Platanoverde mostly wants to show what young local artists are doing. Both visions and practices complement each other nicely. By a turn of good luck, it looks like Platanoverde and Dmente plan on coming out around the same time in February. If that happens, these new magazines will have overcome much already, hopefully making that hole just a little bigger.