No matter what comes to mind when you think of Latin America, “Resilience,” the photography exhibition at the Instituto Cervantes, will challenge long-held concepts, ideas and stereotypes of this vast and diverse region. “Resilience” brings different aesthetics, perspectives, approaches and subjects together to paint a picture of the complexity and nuance of Latin America today.
Hundreds of vibrant panels, contrasting in color and varying in size, collectively comprise a 300-foot long mural. Among the most striking images are giant oil-covered pelicans and helpless fish dying in their contaminated environment. Alongside these paintings are passionate hand-written messages that evoke both curiosity and sympathy. Together, the messages tell a story of corporate irresponsibility, environmental devastation, and a vital need for sustainability. “I am mourning the gulf and pray this is not the beginning of the end,” reads one. Another person has written, “For 200 years we’ve been conquering the nature. Now we are beating it to death.”
Intentionally blurring the boundaries between art and activism, Vienna-based artist Oliver Ressler has produced a prolific body of explicitly political works. His theme-specific exhibitions, projects in public space, and multi-part video installations embody new methods of global resistance. Through these works, he relentlessly tackles a wide range of critical topics such as racism, economic globalization, and genetic engineering.
On February 18, 1977, a thousand Nigerian soldiers surrounded the Kalakuta Republic and burned it to the ground.
As republics go, Kalakuta wasn’t very large. Only 100 or so people lived there. But the immensely popular musician Fela Anikulapo-Kuti had created this compound, in the Nigerian capital of Lagos, as a joyful and democratic space in an otherwise corrupt and dictatorial country. The sovereignty of Fela’s republic was always under threat. And even though the invaders threw his mother from the second floor on that day in 1977, and even though the soldiers cracked his skull, and even though the government jailed him for trying to defend himself, Fela continued to fight back. He used his Afrobeat music and biting lyrics as his weapon.
Operating from Delhi since the early 1990s, Raqs Media Collective has developed a multifaceted body of work with a unique take on globalized culture. Mixing contemporary art with historical and philosophical theory, their diverse work consists of a wide range of old and new media techniques, including image-text collages, installations, performances, and media objects.
EU Green Card Lottery: Registration Office, installation view, exhibition “The Embassy / Apocalypse Now”, Paris, 2007
Andrea Geyer/Sharon Hayes/Ashley Hunt/Katya Sander/David Thorne 9 scripts from a Nation at War, 2007 10 channel video Installation, HDV, color, sound
Trevor Paglen is a writer and “experimental geographer” holding a Ph.D. in geography from Berkeley. His thought-provoking visual artworks deliberately blur the lines between social science, contemporary art, political theory, and activism. Constructing unusual but meticulously researched reinterpretations of our world, Paglen is an artist whose work is so radically new that it forces viewers to redefine what constitutes art.
On May 1, 2003, George W. Bush held an Iraq War victory celebration aboard the aircraft carrier, USS Lincoln, a moment of triumph that has since metamorphosed into the very embodiment of folly as the bloody war continues to grind on. On that faraway date Bush stood beneath a mammoth banner that read, “Mission Accomplished.” Ed Koren has memorialized the event very differently from what the president intended.