The present dissertation aims to analyze the performance of Gonzaga Duque as an art critic. This work reconstructs the trajectory of the aesthetic influences that had composed the theoretical universe of reference for the performance of Gonzaga Duque as an art critic. This study emphasizes the relationship of the author with the Symbolism, but equally approaches different sources and critical experiences involving contemporaries` artists and critics with relevance for its period, such as Baudelaire, Zola and Ruskin. This study indicates that Gonzaga Duque has a successful acting as critic, performing at the same time experimental and a theoretical analysis opened to the challenges of the present, building a singular conception of modernity. The dissertation also aims to analyze the art reviews themselves with peculiar emphasis to some relevant artists in the period. This study it allows the meditation about the amplitude, but also the limits of the critic, mainly referring to the comprehension of a certain plastic modernity, not incorporated by the author. Finally, the study allows thinking the specificities of this historical period composing a social and cultural scene, with its main elements, indicating the singular aspects that allowed to the Gonzaga Duque to cross the borders of the Brazilian art.