These works are set alongside a short film by Roberto Evangelista (Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre,1946).  The exhibition takes Evangelista’s film as the starting point for a reflection on the possibilities of locating geometry in the visual arts. Mater Dolorosa – In Memorian II (Of the Creation and Survival of Forms) presents a mystical conception of geometry that sets it apart from the tradition of 20th century geometric abstraction in Brazil and internationally.

For more information see: http://www.maddoxarts.com/exhibitions/

To sabotage is to disrupt a dynamic, to purposefully or unconsciously ruin or fail a system.  Once primarily a worker’s strategy, sabotage has become a recurring artistic practice in contemporary art and one partaking in the ‘reflexive turn’ of late modernity’s aesthetic practices. From the 1960s onwards, the aesthetic notion of sabotage has been notoriously present in Latin American art as a central mechanism of resistance against censorship and a cultural practice confronting state violence, heterosexual normativity, and neoliberalism.

For more information: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/art-history/events/sabotage-symposium

The exhibition at Lisson Gallery includes musical instruments created from firearms, including revolvers, shot-guns and machine-guns, which were crushed by tanks and steamrollers to render them useless. These were offered to the artist by the Mexican government following their confiscation and subsequent public destruction in the city of Ciudad, Juarez.

Pedro Reyes (b. 1972, Mexico City) lives and works in Mexico. Reyes rose to international attention with projects such as Capulas (2002-10), Baby Marx (2009-present) and Palas por Pistolas (2008). Reyes’ exhibition Disarm at Lisson Gallery, London (2013), is his first UK solo show. Previous solo exhibitions include Labor, Mexico City (2012, 2010); Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (2011); Guggenheim Museum, New York (2011); CCA Kitakyushu, Kitakyushu (2009); Bass Museum, Miami (2008); and San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco (2008). Disarm will be Reyes’ first show with Lisson Gallery and his first solo show in the UK.

For more information:

http://www.lissongallery.com/#/exhibitions/2013-03-27_pedro-reyes/

Often documenting her interactions with specific individuals and communities, Santiago’s films and videos focus on how social relations are embodied in particular places and gestures. Drawing from anthropology and experimental theatre, the artist develops her work together with the people she portrays, using performance and re-enactment as strategies for self-representation. Her previous works range from an interview with controversial Puerto Rican artist Carlos Irizarry, subsequently interpreted through dance, to an observational documentary about the routine tasks of present-day anarchist communities in San Francisco.

For her exhibition at Gasworks, Santiago has produced two new works that explore the contemporary landscape of Puerto Rico through an historical lens. The video La Cueva Negra (2013) investigates the transformation of a former archaeological site, whereas the 16mm film Farmacopea (2013) looks at how distinctive features of the island’s natural landscape relate to the development of agriculture and tourism.  Farmacopea, on the other hand, looks at how the Puerto Rican landscape has been transformed and de-historicised by tourism and the service industry.

For more information:

http://www.gasworks.org.uk/exhibitions/detail.php?id=839

Contemporary Art Society introduces the first in a new series of seminars looking at the very best of contemporary visual practice by geography.  Our International Focus series will outline and explore important developments in our global contemporary arts ecology, each edition being delivered by an invited guest speaker with a particular specialism in that region. 

 International Focus: Mexico will be led by Contemporary Art Society’s Miriam Metliss, whose specialism lies in Latin American Art.  This seminar will provide an in-depth look at Mexico’s dynamic contemporary art scene, drawing out important new artists and key moments in contemporary Mexican and Latin American art both internally and globally. Set against the context of the ever strengthening Latin American art market and ahead of Zona Maco, the most important art fair in Mexico in April 2013 in Mexico City, this seminar responds to the rapidly rising level of interest in Latin American art in London and internationally.

Contemporary Art Society, 59 Central Street, London EC1V 3AF £15 Members (£30 Non Members)

Booking is essential – RSVP to membership@contemporaryartsociety.org to reserve your place.

De Barros discovered photography as a young painter, and was soon using multiple exposures, camera rotations, over-painting and scratching of negatives to radically abstract his subjects. The resulting series Fotoformas was exhibited at the Museu de Arte de São Paulo in 1950.  De Barros only revisited photography late in life following a series of strokes, when his daughter unearthed a box of negatives from his personal archive. In the last two years of his life he made Sobras (Remains), a final burst of photographic energy which resulted in over 250 intricate collages.

What Remains traces subtle connections across the two series, showing them alongside vintage contact prints and archival material. Together they reveal distinct processes of production, which in turn suggest relationships to his parallel practices as draughtsman, designer, painter and engraver.

The exhibition is curated by Isobel Whitelegg and is kindly supported by the Embassy of Brazil in London, FDFA Presence Switzerland and the Rumi Foundation.

http://thephotographersgallery.org.uk/geraldo-de-barros-4

This was a panel discussion with Jochen Voltz (Head of Programmes at Serpertine Gallery, London), Tanya Barson (Curator, International Art, Tate Modern) chaired by Kiki Mazzucchelli.  It was organized by ABACT (Associação Brasileira de Arte Contemporânea) and was held at the Brazilian Embassy in London, October 8th 2012.

For further information about ABACT visit http://abact.com.br/

Alongside work from the past six years this exhibition presents a newly commissioned sculpture, which takes the form of a plinth bearing the oxide traces of the sculpture it once supported. Pica’s plinth is as much about the object itself as it is a suggestion of an absent counterpart.

This exhibition continues a conversation, which began with Pica’s first solo UK exhibition at Chisenhale Gallery, London, earlier this year.  Included is her large-scale work Strangers on Common Land, 2012, shows two strangers standing in an open landscape, connected by the line of bunting that they hold and the common land on which they stand; a metaphor for the possibility of coming together through cultural celebration.

Also featured is Pica’s series of sculptures Catachresis, 2011-2012 that denote something for which there is no other name (catachresis), such as the leg of a table or the elbow of a pipe.

Pica’s profile continues to rise both in the UK and internationally.  In recent years she has exhibited across Europe and America most notably at the 54th Venice Biennale (2011), the New Museum Triennial, New York(2012) and as New Generation Art Prize nominated artist.

For more information see:
http://www.modernartoxford.org.uk/whats-on/amalia-pica-2012/about/