Opening March 30th at Craig Krull Gallery, thirteen Costa Rican artists present Seguimos, an exhibition that offers original and vibrant contemporary artwork previously unseen in the U.S.
As co-curated by Los Angeles-based gallerist Hannah Sloan and the Craig Krull Gallery, work by Adrián Arguedas Ruano, Alina González, Allegra Pacheco, Christian Wedel, Isaac Loría, Javier Calvo, La Cholla Jackson, Lucía Howell, Luciano Goizueta, Matias Sauter Morera, Mimian Hsu Chen, Priscilla Romero-Cubero and Valiente Pastel explore a wide range of mediums while providing a fresh perspective on subjects such as the body, identity, and place.
Video, photography, and installations are joined by paintings, works on paper, and free-standing sculptures. Seguimos, which translates as “we keep going” takes its name from an exhibited installation that features some 120 works on paper by conceptual artist Priscilla Romero-Cubero.
Romero-Cubero registered liquid latex imprints of fingers – those of dozens of individuals. The imprints are positioned in groupings of four and marked with the slashes of diagonal tally marks. What is being tallied is a harsh statistic revealing the continued counting of the disappeared and silenced, victims of death and injustice. Thematically, this piece, and the overall exhibition, shape a powerful testimony to unforgettable lives and memory.
The personal and the political are both intrinsic to the exhibition. Javier Calvo’s “El Blanco es Relativo” (“White is Relative”) focuses on racial stereotype with an image of Calvo’s arm, on which these words are tattooed. The pointed message behind them relates to a racial stereotype in a country that is often incorrectly generalized as being non-white.
Morphing her own nude figure within mirrored fragments and the landscape of Costa Rica itself, artist Lucia Howell shapes video art that infuses a symbolic magic into a world that exudes the mystery of a mythological realm.
Body image is also at the core of works from Alina González that serve as a reflection of identity as a transgender woman. The artist combines these self-portraits with those of star talent in the transgender pornography industry as well as those of iconic cultural figures such as Bridget Bardot.
Queer culture in Latin America is also the subject of the irreverent and witty images of Valiente Pastel, who paints over erotic advertising and found objects to create a narrative that normalizes and satirizes sexual behaviors often hidden or occluded by shame, society, or both.
In the works of Allegra Pacheo, (above) intimate paintings of boxers and MMA fighters in motion emphasize her own body and physicality as she trains in an intensely masculine setting. The artist and documentarian’s work is suffused with energy and vigilant fierceness.
La Cholla Jackson presents a gritty and absorbing assemblage, shaping fashionable stiletto heels and pumped sneakers into a large-scale sculpture that reimagines high fashion through the lens of her own drag performances.
The exhibition traverses the terrain of geographic bodies as well as those of the human form. Mimian Hsu Chen creates her own sculptural work recontextualizing items of clothing and adornment as a 26-foot “waterfall” of diaphanous fabric sewn with embroidery, beads, and pearls. This textile work represents the seaweed and algae that drifts between the countries of Costa Rica and Taiwan, flotsam with no conception of political boundaries.
Matias Sauter Morera (above) depicts rich photographic images of the tropical, biodiverse Costa Rican landscape; self-taught painter Isaac Loria (below) offers light-filled fecund images painted al fresco on unstretched canvases that capture the lush beauty of his grandfather’s remote farm, the location where he paints.
The vibrant physical landscape is also the subject of Christian Wedel’s work.
His images examine the coexistence and comingling of the qualities shared by both flora and humans in the density of the tropics.
Engravings and woodcuts created by renowned Costa Rican printmaker Adrián Arguedas Ruano (above) depict a traditional masquerade festival in his hometown.
And Luciano Goizueta (below) brings the video project, “Colección de Ahoras/Collection of Nows” to the gallery, a luminous work that reflects brief incidental moments in the life of a Costa Rican artist.
Each of the works in Seguimos is in its own way both self-reflective and universal, dedicated to the dynamic hope and belief that art, landscape, and humankind each shape a passionate commitment to the idea that “we continue.” It is an exhibition both as deeply devoted to the soul as it is to each of these bodies.
Seguimos will be on view March 30 through May 18, 2024. The artist reception runs from 4:30 to 6:30 on the 30th, with several of the participating artists taking part in an artist talk at 3 p.m., prior to the opening reception. Craig Krull Gallery is located at Santa Monica’s Bergamot Station in building B3.
- Genie Davis; images provided by the exhibition