Lo que ya tenía nombre

The Cultural Center of Spain in Mexico presents the group exhibition Lo que ya tenía nombre.

The collective exhibition integrates multiple reflections on migration, a complex phenomenon made up of different social, geographical and ecological layers. The exhibition explores various artistic formats and is approached from the perspective of 13 artists from various latitudes.

This exhibition seeks to think of migration as a metaphor in continuous expansion and not only from an anthropocentric vision; brings together the work of artists from different territories to rehearse a look, to provoke an approach to the experience that migration implies, both for those who leave and for those who remain.

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Saying Kale, Rapita, Rehana, Kakatina and Zollies can be a wound now that their references no longer exist. We are talking about the five Pacific islands that disappeared between 1962 and 2015. The sea in its constant movement and due to a combination of factors (including climate change) covered them. To say Kale, Rapita, Rehana, Kakatina and Zollies is to name something that already had a name and that now lives only in the rugged terrain of memory.

Everything on one scale or another moves, migrates. Whether inert or alive, the world is changing. Currently, war and poverty, violence and impoverishment generated by capitalism and colonialism are some of the circumstances that cause each year about three hundred million people to risk their lives in migratory processes both in Europe and North America. Whether on boats in the Mediterranean, on the wall of Melilla, when crossing Latin America or risking all the dangers that Mexico presents when pursuing the American dream; Direct and/or structural violence spreads throughout the world.

Migrating is the cause and consequence of life itself. Human intervention in the generation of political borders and inequalities accelerates, tensions and violently this transition. Trying to prevent this right is the result of unlimited appropriation and the manipulation of power to perpetuate its privileges.

In this exhibition we seek to think of migration as a metaphor in continuous expansion and not only from an anthropocentric vision; We integrate pieces that address and investigate the migration phenomenon to look at the different layers that construct it. We bring together the work of artists from different territories to rehearse a look; provoke an approach to the experience that migration implies, both for those who leave and for those who remain.

Participating artists:

Alejandra Aragón (Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, 1983)

Alejandra Aragón is from Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, through photography, video, objects, performative and collaborative strategies Alejandra explores the intersections between territory, body, representation and identity from a postcolonial and intersectional position. She was part of the Image Center Photography Seminar in 2017. Member of the Joop Swart Masterclass 2020, nominated for the Oskar Barnack award in 2021. The same year she obtained the NALAC Border Change Narrative Scholarship in the US. In 2022 she won the Latin American Award from the Sony World Photography Awards and entered the National System of Creators of Mexico.

Antonia Alarcón (Santiago de Chile, 1994)

Visual artist, writer and researcher of textile media. She graduated in Plastic and Visual Arts from the National School of Painting, Sculpture and Engraving “La Esmeralda”. She is a collaborator at the Latent Image Institute and was a scholarship recipient of the FONCA Young Creators program, generation 2020-2021.

She has published her texts in media such as Terremoto, GASTV and OndaMX. She recently researches non-human migration processes, sustainable textile practices and how to create spaces for dialogue through art.

Marilyn Boror Bor (San Juan Sacatepéquez, Guatemala, 1984)

She is a Mayan-Kaqchikel artist who questions patriarchy and racism through photography, painting, printmaking, installation and performance. She has a degree in Fine Arts from the University of San Carlos of Guatemala. He was a Fellow of the Utopía Foundation (Spain, 2016), received the Espira/La Espora Residency for Emerging Central American Artists scholarship three times (Nicaragua, 2011-2014) and participated in residencies and conferences in the United States, Central America, Mexico, Germany , Chile and Spain. His work has been presented at the Museum of Contemporary Art of Puerto Rico (San Juan), the Museum of Contemporary Art of Panama, the Reina Sofía Museum (Madrid), the Galerie im körnerpark (Berlin), WhiteBOX (Munich), the Museum of Contemporary Art Santa Barbara (California), the Pre-Columbian Museum of Chilean Art (Santiago) and the NUMU (Guatemala), among others. She participated in the International Biennial of Contemporary Art of the South (Guatemala, 2021), the Biennial in Resistencia (Guatemala, 2018 and 2021), the Paiz Art Biennial (Guatemala, 2014, 2016 and 2021). She lives and works in Guatemala.

Nuria Güell (Vidreres, Spain, 1981)

She graduated in Fine Arts from the University of Barcelona, specializing in Sculpture, and continued her studies at the Chair of Behavioral Art in Havana, Cuba. Her artistic practice is characterized by being a practice of confrontation, of questioning evidence and moral conventions. She understands her practice as socially and politically necessary, in which the cultural and the established come into play.

She held her first public exhibition in 2005, and since then she has participated in some 200 group exhibitions and 27 individual exhibitions, spread mainly between Europe and America. Likewise, she has also received several awards and scholarships throughout her career and regularly collaborates with social and educational centers.

JL Martín / Antropotrip (Tijuana, Baja California, 1975)

Audiovisual artist, musician and communicator, member of the National System of Art Creators, generation 2021. He explores the intermediary relationships between non-fiction, live cinema and composition, through the concept of erratic cinema. He is currently developing the audiovisual performance Trasiego, an investigation into the relationships between borders and water cultures, in various areas of Mexico. He has a degree from the UABC Tijuana (Mexico). Diploma in Creative Documentary from the Universidad del Valle (Cali, Colombia). Master in Integrative Research by Real World Multiversity Edgar Morin (Mexico). Creditor of the PADID Teaching, Research and Dissemination of the Arts Support Program (2018-19) with the endorsement of the CENART Multimedia Center; of the IMCINE Film Creator Stimulus (2011); Ibermedia Program scholarship (2010); of the Program of Stimuli for the Creation and Artistic Development of Baja California PECDA (2009); from the Support Program for Production and Research in Art and Media of CENART (2005) and the Support Program for Municipal and Community Cultures PACMYC (1999); He has presented his creative and academic work in various cities in Mexico, the United States, Latin America and Europe.

Valeriano López (Huéscar, Granada, Spain, 1963)

His unorthodox work combines plastic, performing and cinematographic arts. An artist without gender who, through irony, carnivalization, iconoclasm and the defense of the right to scandal, tests institutional limits.

Some of the spaces where his work has been seen are CCB, Barcelona, MNCA Reina Sofía, Madrid; Arnolfini Art Centre, Bristol; Cultuurcentrum, Bruges; Carrillo Gil Art Museum, C.Mexico; Museum of Modern Art of Buenos Aires; 49th edition of the Venice Biennale; 12th Biennial of Contemporary Art of Senegal; 11th Havana Biennial; 25th Alexandria Biennial, Anthology Film Archives, New York; P&I Screening International Film Festival Rotterdam; Castelli Animatia, Rome; Medellin Film Festival, etc.

«Moris» Israel Meza Moreno (Mexico, 1978)

He studied a Bachelor of Fine Arts at the National School of Painting, Sculpture and Engraving “La Esmeralda” (Mexico City) and is co-founder of Colectivo Viernes (2005). His work focuses on the transition between power imbalances and violence. Some of the elements of his work are extracted from specific contexts, so in addition to constructing a record of dynamics of illegality and violence, they activate an experience in which the viewer is confronted with objects that come from apparently invisible environments that have been disrupted by community violence. He has participated in multiple individual and group exhibitions, including: A shot in the air, Marc Straus Gallery (NY 2020); There is a bullet for everyone out there, NF Nieves Fernández. (Madrid, Spain 2019); Punch to the stomach, ARCO Lisboa Solo Projects. (Lisbon, Portugal 2018); Four legs good, two feet bad Arróniz Contemporary Art. (Mexico City 2018); Prey and Predator, Record of Illegality and Violence and A Monster Walks Among You, Siqueiros Public Art Room (Mexico 2014) among others.

Diego Miguel María/F*ck la migra (San Lorenzo Achiotepec, Hidalgo, 1981)

After his forced deportation from the United States in 2016, Diego Miguel founded a group that offered support to returned people. In 2018 he opened the doors of his own screen printing workshop in the working class neighborhood, where he creatively raises awareness and gives visibility to the issue of mass deportation and family separation through screen printing.

Omar Pimienta (Tijuana, Baja California, 1978)

He lives and works in the border region of what he calls Imagined California. He is a visual artist, writer and academic, his work explores questions of identity, transnationality, poetics of emergency, and sociopolitical landscapes. He received his MFA and PhD in Literature both degrees from the University of California, San Diego. In 2017-18 his visual work was supported by the Art Matters fellowship, New York. He has published four books of poetry in Mexico, the U.S. Spain and Argentina, one of which was awarded the 10th Emilio Prado International Publication Award Málaga, Spain. In 2019-22 he was a Member of the National System of Art Creators. He is currently a professor of border and migration studies in the Americas in the department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Elizabeth Ross (Mexico City, 1954)

Artist, independent researcher, encounter weaver, curator and healer with more than 35 years of practice. She creates and collaborates in artistic and social projects, privileging participatory processes with feminism as a transversal axis. Her work has touched base in closed, public and wild spaces in the Americas, Europe, Turkey, Japan, Australia and China. Her practice focuses on transmigration, myth and ritual, and how they intertwine across diverse territories to seek empathic currents of action and thought. She founds and directs a cell, art and community to generate artistic projects at an international level. Honorary member of the National System of Art Creators, she is director of the Chinese Video Artists Festival.

Sindicato de Manteros (Barcelona, Spain, 2015)

The institutional violence of the Spanish Immigration Law prevents, through various bureaucratic obstacles, the regularization of thousands of African migrants who, in order to survive, dedicate themselves to street commerce on the streets of Spain, where they spread their blankets to offer different types of imitation products.

The Manteros Union was born on October 10, 2015, in the city of Barcelona as a result of the mysterious death of the Senegalese Mor Sylla, which occurred in a Mossos d'Esquadra raid against street vendors (top manta) in Salau, Tarragona. This anti-union is a space for mutual support between people who are dedicated to informal commerce in Spain. Made up mostly of men between 19 and 45 years old, of African origin with training in different fields.

Curators:

Abril Castro Prieto (Tijuana, Baja California, 1976)

Cultural manager and transfeminist poet. She studied the Bachelor's Degree in Hispanic American Language and Literature (UABC) and the Master's Degree in Cultural Promotion and Development (UAdeC, Coahuila). She is coordinator of the visual arts department at the Museo Universitario del Chopo. She is especially interested in art with community impact; the peripheral and the dissidence, the break and the detour.

A selection of her curatorial projects include Lumbre, Ilutradoras en México (Museo Universitario del Chopo, UNAM, 2023) co-curated with Itzel Vargas Platas and Karol Wolley, Belleza y Felicidad, arte y cultura Salvaje en el Baires de los 90, (Museo Universitario del Chopo, UNAM, 2023 the Laboratory of dissident writings (Museo Universitario del Chopo, 2021), V National Research Meeting on Photography (Centro de la Imagen, CDMX) co-curated with Sayak Valencia Triana, Espacios Comunes, (Museum of Art of Ciudad Juárez and Cultural Center of Spain in Mexico 2013-2014) co-curated with Felipe Zúñiga González.

Isidro López-Aparicio / iLA (Santisteban del Pto. Jaén, Spain, 1967)

Artist, curator, researcher and social activist. Professor at the University of Granada, Master in Environmental Management from the Open International University (EU), member of the Higher Institute for Peace and Conflict Research, he regularly gives conferences and seminars around the world. Awarded/scholarship for international artistic studies and creation. He has numerous publications among the latest: Political art and social commitment.CENDEAC. Honorary President of the Fine Art European Forum and the Union of Associations of Visual Artists of Spain, editor of the Journal for Artistic Research, representative at the IAA Europe, etc.

His personal career with a marked political and social character, working in processes that are linked to contexts and expressing himself through numerous media, has had a solid presence and professional recognition, regularly participating in international fairs and collaborating in Museums and galleries in Italy. , United Kingdom, Portugal, Germany, Holland, Belgium, USA, Hungary, Finland, Russia, China, Egypt, Greece, Fiji, Romania, Papua N. Guinea, Norway, United Arab Emirates, Mexico, etc. in centers such as Darat al Funum, Inter Art Gallery, 798 Art Distric Pekin, TATE, Palermo Modern Art Gallery, Columbia S.C., ARTifariti, Tamarind I., Imatran Taidemuseo, MNCAreina Sofía, Pushkinskaya 10 Art Center, POMPIDOU, etc.

* Migrating is not being born again, it is renaming what already had a name is a line from the poem Panchilandia by Gabriela Wiener

— Cultural Center of Spain