Memorias de la Obsolescencia

Selección de videos en la Colección Ella Fontanals-Cisneros

Centro de Arte Contemporáneo Wifredo Lam, Havana, Cuba │ September 1 - December 1, 2013

Curated by Jesús Fuenmayor.

The Cisneros Fontanals Art Foundation Europa (CIFO Europa), The Centro de Arte Contemporáneo Wilfredo Lam and the Consejo Nacional de Artes Plásticas presented Memorias de la Obsolescencia. Selección de videos en la Colección de Ella Fontanals-Cisneros at the Centro LAM in Havana from September 1 through December 1, 2013.

Memorias de la Obsolescencia. Selección de videos en la Colección de Ella Fontanals-Cisneros brings together a selection of pieces from the Collection of Ella Fontanals-Cisneros that share video as their medium. This is a collection of works by artists of all nationalities and backgrounds selected for their potential in questioning the medium they use. With a variety of approaches that pass from documentation to the fiction and all intermediate hybrid narrative formulas, many of the works presented are explorations about the possibilities and implications of integrating time into their work. Therefore, they are related to something happening or something that happened; the cause and effect of actions of which they are produced, thus establishing a close link with the performance. The performance is another mean of contemporary visual arts that introduces the present into the materiality of object in the visual field.

The artists included also bring a diversity of historical references, such as the first experiments with video in the sixties and seventies. These experiments were linked to conceptualist practices, or feminist art in general concerning the process of identifying sexual or ethnic minorities. They also highlight the interest in hybrid complexities of contemporary cultures influenced by anthropological thought in addition to questioning the possibility of intervening in the process of building the history of our time also taking into account reflections on urban space policies. The exhibit is very representative of the different approaches, not only to video, but overall artistic production today.

This exhibit, curated by Jesús Fuenmayor, is the second initiative of the newly founded CIFO EUROPA. As a branch to CIFO Miami, it was created to continue the foundation’s mission of fostering cultural exchange among the visual arts and to promote contemporary art from Latin America.