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PAINTING SITUATIONS: SIGFREDO CHACÓN AND LILIANA PORTER
ISLAA ARTIST SEMINAR INITIATIVE
October 12 - December 8, 2022
University Gallery
Painting Situations: Sigfredo Chacón and Liliana Porter/ISLAA Artist Initiative curated by Jesús Fuenmayor and Kaira M. Cabañas and taking place in the Gary R. Libby University Gallery, is the first exhibition in the ISLAA Artist Seminar Initiative / UF series.
The Institute for Studies on Latin American Art (ISLAA) designed its Artist Seminar Initiative to support academic institutions in fostering intimate exchanges between students and living artists from Latin America. For this first iteration at University Galleries, the work of renowned artists Sigfredo Chacón and Liliana Porter informed the two-semester program of a curatorial seminar followed by an exhibition. Students in art history and museum studies took part in the seminar led by Jesús Fuenmayor in Spring 2022 and also serve as members of the curatorial advisory committee to the exhibition.
Painting Situations: Sigfredo Chacón and Liliana Porter showcases the work of two pioneers of Latin American conceptualism. The curators chose to focus on Chacón’s and Porter’s most emblematic projects: his Pinturasparlantes (Speaking-paintings) and her Forced Labor series. In doing so, the exhibition highlights how, despite each artist’s deployment of radically different aesthetic strategies, the works on view share a common ambition. Each artist’s work critically comments on painting as a medium and as a situation that calls upon viewers’ lived experiences and attention to social contexts. Chacón’s practice focuses on dismantling painting’s modernist programs by inscribing language within its visual field as they attempt an unmediated communication with their audience, while Porter turns to the invisible labor of painting and how gender and class intersect beyond its traditional frame.
Painting Situations is complemented by a second exhibition Más Situaciones: Sigfredo Chacón and Liliana Porter (parts I and II), which is curated by doctoral candidates Helena Chen and Laura Colkitt in the Gary R. Libby Focus Gallery as part of the series “On View: Curatorial Studies.” For the exhibition at the Focus Gallery, Porter will present her video Actualidades. The stochastic film incorporates nonlinear vignettes of miniature figurines engaged in unexpected or surprising situations. Analogously arranged like a newspaper, the video’s segments display expressive scenarios--from tender to farcical--evoking a range of human experiences. Chacón will present a selection of the works related to his 1972 installation Situaciones [Situations], a series of pieces that he recently reconstructed for his solo exhibition in a private foundation in Miami. Treating painting as objects, the installation explores the situational aesthetic and references military forces as well as organized oppression in Venezuela.
A fully-illustrated catalogue with contributions by the curators and interviews with the artists will be published by University Galleries.
The exhibition program and publication are sponsored by the Institute for Studies on Latin American Art and the School of Art + Art History, University of Florida, Gainesville. Additional event sponsors include the Harn Eminent Scholar Chair in Art History and the UF Center for the Humanities and the Public Sphere (Rothman Endowment).
EXHIBITION RELATED PROGRAMMING
October 12, 5–7 PM
Opening of Painting Situations: Sigfredo Chacón and Liliana Porter and Más Situaciones: Sigfredo Chacón and Liliana Porter
October 28, 3 PM
Exhibition tour of Painting Situations: Sigfredo Chacón and Liliana Porter and Más Situaciones (part 1), led by by Laura Colkitt
November 10, 5 PM
Exhibition tour of Painting Situations: Sigfredo Chacón and Liliana Porter and Más Situaciones (part 2), led by Helena Chen
November 16, 5 PM
Exhibition tour of Painting Situations: Sigfredo Chacón and Liliana Porter, led by Jesús Fuenmayor
November 16, 6 PM
Lecture by Sérgio B. Martins: “Art as Project, Project as Art,” College of the Arts, University of Florida, Room FAB 105
About University Galleries
University Galleries is comprised of three art galleries that play an integral role in the teaching mission of the School of Art + Art History, College of the Arts at the University of Florida, as well as serving the entire UF and Gainesville community.
University Gallery (UG) UG’s primary mission is to provide the greater Gainesville community with a contemporary venue that explores new directions in visual art, incorporating historical perspectives as well. UG collaborates with myriad UF colleges, community and regional entities in creating a trans-disciplinary venue for artwork that is relevant to education at UF, and the greater north-central Florida region. Exhibitions feature nationally/internationally known artists, a studio art faculty exhibition, and MFA graduating thesis project exhibitions.
Gary R. Libby Gallery presents art exhibitions that are organized by graduate student curators, in conjunction with the director of the galleries, providing an opportunity for students to learn experientially about curation, exhibition design, and presentation, and visitors to view professionally presented shows that primarily feature contemporary art.
Constance and Linton Grinter Gallery of International Art presents exhibitions organized by graduate student curators, in conjunction with the director of the galleries that feature international and multicultural artworks. This venue allows graduate students to learn experientially about curation and exhibition design, and visitors to experience art and artifacts from across world cultures.
Parking Information
Daytime parking is available in reserved spaces between Fine Arts Building C (FAC) and Inner Road. From SW 13th Street, enter campus on Museum Drive. Turn right on Newell Drive, then right on Inner Road. Turn left into the parking lot behind FAC. The first three spaces on the left are reserved for gallery use. Parking permits are issued to gallery visitors in the University Gallery.
For more information, please contact the University Gallery at (352) 273-3000 or visit our website at www.arts.ufl.edu/galleries.
About the College of the Arts
The College of the Arts is one of the 16 colleges and more than 150 research centers and institutes at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida. The College of the Arts offers baccalaureate, master’s and Ph.D. degree programs in its three institutionally-accredited schools — the School of Art + Art History, School of Music and School of Theatre + Dance. The college is home to the Center for Arts in Medicine, Center for Arts and Public Policy, Center for World Arts, Digital Worlds Institute, University Galleries and the New World School of the Arts in Miami. More than 100 faculty members and approximately than 1,200 students work together daily to engage, inspire and create. The college hosts more than 300 performances, exhibitions and events each year. Faculty and students also exhibit and perform at other local, national and international venues. To learn more, visit www.arts.ufl.edu.
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