Artists: Alejandro Almanza, Edgardo Aragón, Erick Beltrán, Emilio Chapela, Gilberto Esparza, Daniel Guzmán, Jorge Méndez-Blake, Miguel Monroy, Begoña Morales, Fernando Ortega, Mark Powell, Pablo Sigg y José Antonio Vega Macotela
Curator: Ruth Estévez
One foot apart discusses actual measurements and procedures that help us to understand the physical and symbolic distances between both things and individuals, between their desires and yearnings. The artists seek to problematize the spaces that separate them or point out the use of indecipherable rhetoric. Thirteen Mexican artists propose a singular vision of the paradox through games applied to all types of situations, both physical and abstract. The artists, the majority of which come from Mexico City, rethink how to deal with contexts that are completely outside of all scale and measurement.
If the Mexican art of the Nineties is recognized for the aestheticization of the idiosyncracies of the urban and the experimentation with its various objects of survival, these artists now deal with a far more subtle and abstract space, that is, however, equally tied to the quotidian: the margin of error in the translation of things, giving way to the most complete uncertainty.
Alejandro Almanza
Born in Mexico City, Mexico, 1977; lives in Mexico City
Alejandro Almanza works towards the theme of risk. In each of his installations created to the site specific, the elements are encountered in an ordered way, causing a dangerous chain. If any of the elements fail to work, the consequences may be catastrophic.
Jorge Méndez Blake
Born in Guadalajara, Mexico, 1974; lives in Guadalajara, Mexico
A cement block sculpture smashes a line of 7 editions of Bartleby, the story by Herman Melville: a scrivener that denied completing his duties. The work is a metaphor using large scale productions generated by capitalism and liberal politics, between the decomposition, valuable input and labor time.
Erick Beltrán
Born in Mexico City, Mexico, 1974; Lives in Barcelona, Spain
Beltrán’s work for the exhibition is a mental map that defines and fits the conceptualization of itself. Through various diagrams, word connexions and thoughts, the artist emphasizes the scale in the development of speeches.
Emilio Chapela
Born in Mexico City, Mexico, 1978; lives in Mexico City, Mexico
The artist extracted the definition of language from Wikipedia to translate it, using an electronic translator from English to Portuguese, to German, to Japanese, to Spanish, to Dutch and finally back again to English. The result is a sentence with no meaning, where the original significance is completely destroyed.
Daniel Guzmán
Born in Mexico City, Mexico, 1964; lives in Mexico City, Mexico
Guzmán’s video is a fable where the artist appeals the impossibility of controlling destiny. At the same time, quips humans for doing so.
Begoña Morales
Born in Lima, Peru, 1977; Lives in Mexico City, Mexico
Some of the houses constructed by the architect Luis Barragán were initiated with the vegetation already existent. With that, the house was able to grow with the trees and not the other way round. In this sculpture series, the artist Begoña Morales, uses and compares garden and house through scales.
Miguel Monroy
Born in Mexico City, Mexico, 1964; lives in Mexico City, Mexico
Contrareloj
In this piece, two mechanisms are built in the same clock, acting in opposite ways, in such manner that, even if time is passing by; the pointers are always at the same hour. The machinery doesn’t remain stable; in fact, it threatens to move every second despite its impossibility of movement.
Equivalente
The artist changed 100 dollars for the equivalent in reais. The reais were changed once again to dollars followed by another change to reais, until the money disappeared. The piece is made of all the receipts obtained during all exchanges.
Fernando Ortega
Born in Mexico City, Mexico, 1971; lives in Mexico City
Ortega’s piece uses objects and moments that enables to distract our saddened mind in consequence of our routine, especially in places as Mexico City. The artist’s interests are inclined to nature’s fragments and openings to the world then to the comprehension of conclusive and systematic concepts.
Mark Powell
Born in Decatur, United States, 1968; Lives in Mexico City, Mexico
In this photographic series, Mark Powell portrays daily landscapes and life of the city. However, despite the unexpected scenes and the objects, the characters that appear seem to be out of these situations.
Edgardo Aragón
Born in Oaxaca, Mexico, 1985; Lives in Oaxaca, Mexico
Memories are Aragón’s principal theme for his developments. Events occurred inside his own family, mark and determine his video direction.
J. Antonio Vega Macotela
Born in Mexico City, Mexico, 1980; Lives in Mexico City, Mexico
Time Divisa is a project that through 365 exchanges with prisoners of Santa Martha Acatitla, explores the possibility of substituting money for mutual favors like an exchange system. In the exchange chosen for the exhibition, all necessary papers were held to free “the clown” from prison, and in exchange, the same should reconstruct the complete map of the prison through his own route. Marking in drawing each step, the prisoner leaves the places that he cannot access in white.
Gilberto Esparza
Born in Aguascalientes, Mexico, 1975; Lives in Mexico City, Mexico
The piece belongs to the series Parasitas Urbanos created by the artist in 2007. The intention is to create life forms that subsists the cost of energy sources generated by human beings and that would engage easily in urban context.
Pablo Sigg
Born in Mexico City, Mexico, 1974; Lives in Mexico City, Mexico
Between 1926 and 1928 Ludwig Wittgenstein and the architect Paul Engelmann drew and constructed in Vienna, a modern style house for Margaret Stonborough, sister of Wittegenstein. Kundmanngasse (name that the Wittegenstein normally called the house) is a cardboard paper model of the only architectural project of the Vienesse philosopher. The piece is part of the series of art works made about Wittegenstein, of which is desired a reflection about the presentation of the event, in this case, about the poor recreation.
Courtesy of: Galeria Kurimanzutto (Daniel Guzmán, Fernando Ortega) – Mexico City, Mexico
Galeria OMR (Erick Beltran, Jorge Méndez-Blake) – Mexico City, Mexico
EDS Galeria (Emilio Chapela) – Mexico City, Mexico