Men, Wolves and Men

It centers on the feelings of disappointment, dejection and impotence. All these works operate in the blind spots of human ethics, whether it be at a general scale –through transcendental or symbolic questions—or at a particular scale –when they allude to concrete facts or specific social agents. Some of them insist on the bonds between politics, memory and violence or between the representation of violence and the show presented by mass media, while others show how corrupted and sordid power is, or the deep roots of chauvinistic prejudices and how politicians play them down. All of them force us to reflect upon the transcendence of individual and collective behavior and upon the limits of human impotence.

Vital Space

It directly relates to the physical space –architecture and city plan, territory and frontier—as well as to the space for the identity. It is divided in two different sub-programs: “Isolated and transplanted urbans” and “Latinos in the art market.” The first one features videos criticizing the development policies in the architectonic space of the cities, showing the contrasts between urban boom and overwhelming underdevelopment. They also explore the surveillance and control, the use of other people’s territories and the toxic and military pollution generated by imperialist armies. The rest of works deal with issues such as the consequences of being uprooted, the contradictions of frontier policies, the condition of foreigner and the resistance to the identity loss. “Latinos in the art market” relates to the other vital space necessary for the survival and visibility in the world of art: the tense balance between the conditions of their mediators (market, institutions, critics and curators) and the artists’ personal choices.

My Way. Lessons on Local Survival

This program is based on the testimonial experience. On the formal level, it takes the form of an interview or an individual or collective portrait, on the conceptual level it deals with the notion of resistance. In part I, the artists display portraits of people who share their daily life from different perspectives: from the accurate description of a specific place, a proper name or a daily action, to the fictionalization of a life which can explain even more than reality itself. It is the camera catching the immediate context of the artists. Part II (Communities) features three documentary films that take their time to immerse us in the daily life of three social groups with very different profiles: the portrait of these particular universes these communities represent it is always based in overcoming the limits imposed by the daily routines and by the projection of desires and dreams; in short, by hope. Lastly, the exhibit focuses on a Colombian classic, the experimental film Agarrando pueblo. Los vampiros de la miseria [Catching People. Misery Vampires, 1978], by Luis Ospina and Carlos Mayolo. The film takes the form of a mock documentary as the facts are not real. It criticizes the filmmakers who exploit misery in order to acquire benefits and how the audience of the first world consumes marginal images. These two filmmakers form the Group of Cali conceived their work as a sharp critique of the pornomiseria (misery-porn) represented by the opportunism of the dishonest documentary makers of the 70s who shot “socio-political documentaries” in the third world so they could sell them in Europe and win awards.