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Photo credit: Brook Jonquil
Photo credit: Carlos Martiel
Photo credit: Casey Smallwood
Photo credit: Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara
Photo credit: Joe Miller
Photo credit: Levi Orta
Photo credit:Rebecca Mir
Photo credit:Danny Volk
Photo credit:Javier Castro
Photo credit:Núria Güell
Photo credit: Patrick Holbrook
Photo credit: Grethell Rasúa
Photo credit: Yali Romagoza Sanchez
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Project History
Arte No Es Fácil began in 2009 when Amor Pirata traveled to Cuba with the sponsorship of the University of Chicago Art Council, Open Practice Committee and the Claire Kantor Foundation. The project continues with the support of Links Hall, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation's International Connections Fund, the University of Chicago’s Department of Visual Arts, and the generous contributions of private donors.
At its core, Arte No Es Fácil is a self-reflexive artwork that uses familiar forms of presentation, both institutional and alternative, to foster a lasting international exchange using the collaborative work of artists as its medium. The project focuses on cultivating relationships between emerging Cuban and American artists, and tests the capacity for collaboration in light of the political, economic and technological barriers at play. The project continues to transform with the thoughts and concerns of its many collaborators past, present and future in an effort to create a two-way passage for information, dialogue and physical presence.
January Program Plan
January 20-22
Fri & Sat at 8pm / Sun at 7pm
Featured performances, screenings, Q&A, collaborative video works, social interventions, and a free installation with the following collaborating artist pairs:
Levi Orta (Havana) /
Manol Gueorguiev (Chicago)
Marilyn Volkman (Chicago) /
Danielle Paz (Chicago)
Ricardo Miguel Hernández (Havana) /
Casey Smallwood (Chicago)
Luis Manuel Otero Alcántara (Havana) /
David Cordero (Chicago)
Joseph Miller (Chicago) /
Hamlet Lavastida (Miami)
Rigoberto Díaz Martinez (Havana) /
Brookhart Jonquil (Miami)
Rebecca Mir (Chicago) /
Nancy Martinez Delgado (Havana)
Carlos Martiel (Havana) /
Erik Wenzel (Chicago)
February Program Plan
Friday February 17
Presentation of the Project by co-creators
Marilyn Volkman / Danielle Paz
The project began in 2009 when Amor Pirata traveled to Cuba with the sponsorship of the University of Chicago Art Council, Open Practice Committee and the Claire Kantor Foundation. The project continues with the support of Links Hall, The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the University of Chicago’s Department of Visual Arts, and the generous contributions of private donors.
Performance Presentation by Collaborating Artists
Carlos Martiel (Havana) / Erik Wenzel (Chicago & Berlin)
Carlos Martiel and Erik Wenzel will create a performance piece about the body and architecture.
Big Brother and Stampede
Hedwig Dances (Chicago), Núria Güell (Barcelona), & Anna Trier (Chicago)
Stampede, by Cuban-born choreographer Marianela Boan, reflects on surviving obstacles imposed by society. The dance is performed around a rotating set of crowd control barriers and features original music by Christian Cherry with a sound design by Ms. Boan.
Marianela Boan is an internationally known choreographer, recognized as one of the most important artists of contemporary Cuban dance and a leader of the Hispanic-American dance vanguard. Her revolutionary style, “Contaminated Dance,” radically merges all the arts in dance performance to produce an original form. As choreographer, dancer and professor, Boan has worked in over 40 countries and created more than 50 choreographic pieces.
Saturday February 18
Distancing (Distanciamiento)
Francisco Masó Alfonso (Havana) and David Hartwell (St. Louis)
Distancing is the conceived action of an artistic project developed by the collaboration of two visual artists, Francisco Masó (Cuba) and David Hartwell (USA). This production consists of a long working process, through which the artists have experienced new aesthetic forms, exchanged aspects of their artistic practices, and apprehended new knowledge. As they say: "… it has allowed us to erect new language able to produce a real experience."
Edén
Javier Castro (Havana)
This video was conceived through an anonymous realization in which the sexual practices of an individual done on the patio of his house were discovered. His imagination for me is a mystery, and his recreation is a performative invitation to those who contemplate it.
Thelma Louise and I
Patrick Holbrook (Chicago)
Seeing Thelma and Louise as a 16 year old came at a good time. It made me aware of the importance of being a good lover when I was learning how to discover women's bodies. Road trips were soon to follow. Body and land correlations are familiar territory, but the way we think about opening is political. If we think about opening as being equally active as passing through, then it's utopic (but real).
The Rambling Woman
Yali Romagosa Sanchez (New York)
The Rambling Woman is a series that the artist began when leaving her native Cuba. The work explores the transformation of cloth through the use of objects in space and memories that she carries everywhere that she goes, thereby making the clothing self-sufficient. The series is inspired by her own journey in the world and especially within the USA. Sanchez seeks to understand and problematize notions of identity, idiosyncrasy and isolation while introducing a line of functional and wearable designs in order to propose a new lifestyle.
Revised and Revisited
Erica Mott (Chicago)
Revised and Revisited is an interdisciplinary performance installation tracing Mott’s memory and absence of memory of her ancestry. She traces her family’s journey, immigration, and assimilation to America through the movement based rituals that have kept them together and ones that have pulled them apart. Incorporating chalkboards as metaphoric palimpsests, suitcases as stages, dresses as scripts, old records as texts, and family photographs as puppets, Mott tells the echo of a story half remembered, one comprised of fragmented histories, fictions, locations, and identities. Through her own journey into the past she calls forward the historic and contemporary border crossings of thousands of others and invites spectators to cross the border between audience and performer inscribing their cultural memory upon the space. Revised and Revisited was developed in collaboration with New Dramatists playwright, Sharon Bridgforth.
Sunday February 19
How to Government: Articles of Proposition and Understanding
Susan Delahante Matienzo (Havana) / Andrea Smith (Chicago)
A collaborative guide for understanding governmental structure through translation, experience and image.
La Tarea del Traductor / The Task of the Translator
Grethell Rasúa (Havana) / Danny Volk (Chicago)
"For there is a philosophical genius that is characterized by a yearning for that language which manifests itself in translations. 'Les langues imparfaites en cela que plusieurs, mangue la suprême: penser étant écrire sans accessories, ni chuchotement mais tacite encore l'immortelle parole, la diversité, sur terre, des idiomes empêche personne de proférer les mots qui, sinon se trouveraient, par une frappe unique, elle-même matériellement la vérité.'"*
*"The imperfection of languages consists in their plurality, the supreme one is lacking: thinking is writing without accessories or even whispering, the immortal word still remains silent; the diversity of idioms on earth prevents everybody from uttering the words which otherwise, at one single stroke, would materialize truth."
from Walter Benjamin's "The Task of the Translator"
translated by Harry Zohn
An Autobiography of Ernestoo In Spanish with Subtitles
Manuel Cordova (Havana) / Latham Zearfoss (Chicago)
An Autobiography of Ernestoo In Spanish with Subtitles is a short performance by Latham Zearfoss who will present a performative reading of an introductory artist's biography written by Manuel Alejandro Hernández Cardona AKA Ernestoo.
About the Artists
Erik Wenzel Recent solo exhibitions include If travel is searching & home what’s been found at the WerkStadt Kulturverein in Berlin, DE in 2011. Live A Little, Live Ennui at the Harold Washington College President's Gallery, and New ‘N’ Lonelier Laze at DOVA temporary, both in Chicago in 2010. In April of 2012 Wenzel will present FRESH FAT at 65GRAND in Chicago. He is co-editor and contributor to “Internal Necessity: a reader tracing the inner logics of the contemporary art field” published by the Sommerakademie at the Zentrum Paul Klee and Sternberg Press.
Carlos Martiel Delgado Sainz is a graduate of the National Academy of Fine Arts "San Alejandro" in Havana, Cuba. He was a participant in ARTE DE CONDUCTA from 2008-2009 and he is currently pursuing studies at the Instituto Superior de Arte, Havana, Cuba. He has performed and exhibited his work at the Estonian Museum of Art and Design in Tallinn, Estonia, the Museum of Arts in Seattle, Washington, the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) in New York, and Das Hochhaus Kokeiri Hansa Museum in Dortmund, Germany. Carlos has also participated in biennials including the 6th Liverpool Biennial, the XXXI Pontevedra Biennial, and the 10th Havana Biennial.
Núria Güell, I think about our institutions and the ethics that they use. I’m interested in discovering the abuses that the government declares as “legal”. At the same time I analyze the mechanisms that create control, and how this control establishes certain behaviors, ideas and floods our senses. These analyses make me visualize their strategies, and a path of new ways to contravene certain crises. To accomplish this I provoke interference in the every day environment, creating other possible realities and altering the relationships within power.
Raised in Barcelona and Havana, Núria Güell was a participant in the 10th Havana Biennial in 2009, the Ponteverdra and Liverpool Biennials in 2010, and the Trienal de Tallin and Bienal de Liubliana in 2011. Her work has traveled throughout Barcelona, La Haya, Madrid, Hertogenbosch, París, New York, Miami, Formigine, Londres and Havana.
Anna Trier founded the Happy Collaborationists in 2009 and currently co-curates the Happy Collaborationists Exhibition Space where curative practice is expressed as a performative activity that has propelled "Happy C" towards a new mode of communication that bridges the gap between art and art events – curation as art.
Hedwig Dances is a contemporary dance theatre ensemble under the artistic direction of its founder, Jan Bartoszek. Hedwig Dances’ bold, interdisciplinary collaborations combine poetic choreography with sculptural artifacts, projected images, and haunting original music. The resulting dances resonate with complexity and depth and provoke emotion, connection, and wonder. In 1992 Department of Cultural Affairs Commissioner Lois Weisberg invited Hedwig Dances to become the dance company in residence at the Chicago Cultural Center. Hedwig Dances reaches out into the community through public performances, collaborations, and dance education. The company is named after Ms. Bartoszek’s paternal grandmother.
Hedwig Dances creates and performs contemporary dance works from a variety of choreographers that convey the essence of the human experience via movement and expression. Through its training and mentoring programs, Hedwig Dances teaches dance and movement to professional dance artists, thereby enriching the cultural life of the individuals and communities it reaches.
Francisco Masó Alfonso is interested in concepts of power and accusation as they function in the disintegration of the social, cultural, and institutional mechanisms--acting as behaviors which are settled deep into the individual. Francisco studied at San Alejandro National Fine Arts Academy in Havana, was a student of Tania Bruguera's Arte de Conducta, and currently studies in the Higher Art Institute (ISA) in the discipline of Stage Design.
David Hartwell Born in Richmond, Virginia, David Hartwell is a visual artist who creates work in a variety of media including photography, video, drawing, and printmaking. Much of his art explores how memory relates to the recording, editing, archiving, and presentation of information, and the many digital and analog processes through which personal and public histories are created. He received a BA in studio art and communications from Stanford University and an MFA from California College of the Arts. He currently lives and works in St. Louis.
Javier Castro: From 2004 to today Javier Castro has completed videos and installations with the intent of capturing the modes of survival within one part of Cuban contemporary society. His work has gone from performance to direct registry with an anthropological perspective. Initially, subjects carry out actions in front of the camera that are previously discussed and agreed on, later their familiarity allows the artist to position the lens as another listener. The artist does not involve politics, nor judge the context. More accurately, he presents it, explores it, and leaves us to see paths of frustrations and worldviews of the common subject in “marginal” zones of the island. Modes of daily cultural resistance, where those in charge are the ones with the loudest voice, the most terrifying pose, the most physical wounds.
Javier Castro’s work has been shown in Cuba, USA, Colombia, Mexico, Bolivia, Uruguay, Ecuador, Argentina, UK, Germany, Belgium, Italy and Spain. He has a Bachelor of Arts from the Instituto Superior de Arte in Havana, a Bachelor of Arts, PP.Sch. Cuba, attached to the Columbus University of Mexico, a Diploma in the Art of Conduct, and a diploma from San Alejandro Academy of Fine arts in Havana.
Patrick Holbrook: Most of Patrick Holbrook's time away from being a full time print and web designer goes into Laughing Eye Weeping Eye, a psychedelic folk music, performance, and moving image collaboration with his partner Rebecca Schoenecker. His own visual project attempts to collapse concepts of territory. He curates exhibitions at Eel Space, his apartment gallery, and teaches at SAIC part-time. He received an MFA from The University of Massachusetts – Amherst.
Yali Romagoza Sanchez was born in Havana, Cuba. Studied Art History and Fine Arts. Is a visual artist, performance maker and fashion designer. In 2009 started the fashion and behavioral project Normal Is Good in a performance at Galeria Habana part of the Havana Biennial. Has exhibited her work at important international events such as Gothenburg Biennial, Havana Biennial, Liverpool Biennial of Contemporary Art. Bétonsalon Centred'art et de recherche, Paris, Art Basel Fair, Miami. Have had collaboration with visual artist like Ezequiel O. Suarez, Tania Bruguera at Gothenburg Biennial, Gothenburg.Performance artist based in NY Carmelita Tropicana, designing her costume in the show feMUSEum Project at Toynbee Studios, Tate Modern and Bethnal Green Working Men’s Club, London.
Erica Mott is a choreographer, puppeteer, performance maker, and cultural organizer who, utilizes body based sculptural forms (mask/costume/object), transforms discarded materials and disregarded spaces. Using the tools of humor and surprise, she captures and heightens the magic and mystery of the mundane and invites communities to re-view and re-envision shared spaces and practices. Erica's recent site-specific performances were featured at Ingenuity Fest (Cleveland), NES (Iceland), Museo del Ferrocarril (Mexico), CAD Special Exhibitions Space/Artopolis. Erica has collaborated nationally with Tim Miller, Eighth Blackbird, Sharon Bridgforth, Coman Poon/re[public] in/decency, and Guillermo Gomez-Pena. She works with Gomez-Pena’s collective, La Pocha Nostra, as a core troupe member. Erica recently was awarded The Santa Fe Art Institute Residency and the Chicago Dancemakers Forum Fellowship. Erica serves as the Director of Education and Community Programming at Links Hall, Chicago.
Andrea Smith: Born in the United States, Andrea Smith does not claim any national allegiance. Investigating site-specific governmental taxonomies, she is interested in infrastructure as a shifting invention that can shape ideas of centralized power. Andrea believes new states can and will be erected with the jurisdiction of other states and that supremacy lies within the individual. Andrea’s work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, you may have seen it.
Susana Pilar Delahante Matienzo lives and work in Havana, Cuba. Currently, she is pursing her Postgraduate studies in New Media at Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design (HfG). Susana studied at the High Institute of Arts (ISA) in Havana, Cuba, and has participated in Braziers International Artists Workshop, Arte de Conducta, “INTERMEDIAE-Minbak”, ARCO 07, and other extra-artistic workshops at the International Forensic Congress in Havana. Susana’s work has been included in the 10th Havana Biennial, the 7th Gwangju Biennial, III Biennale Arts Actuels Réunion, in France, Torbellino II_Whirlwind II at Galeria Habana, Again and Again curated by Adrian Paci at Galleria La Veronica Arte Contemporánea, Italy, and Medium Religion curated by Boris Groys and Peter Weibel at ZKM, Karlsruhe and Model Art and Niland Gallery, Sligo. In 2012 she will participate in the 2012 Havana Biennial.
Susana's elaborately staged productions feature herself as a corpse and draw from a long tradition of self- portraits which serve as a memento reaching beyond death in attempt to keep the artist’s memory as vivid as possible. By contrast, Susana’s photographs immortalize a materialistic truth by simultaneously addressing the objectifying glance of the photographic camera, and the moment of death in the production of an image as well as of a corpse.
Danny Volk was born in Akron, Ohio in 1979. He earned a BA in Theater Studies from Kent State University (2006) in Ohio. Volk's videos and performances explore the dramaturgical structures of interactions in public and domestic settings. In these explorations, he asks his viewers to buy into both the theatrical nature of the performance and the reality from which it draws, eliciting questions of authenticity and belief. Exploring the management of an identity, Volk takes on roles that are on the periphery of his own understanding of self often buying into his own process and going native. Volk has exhibited at High Concept Laboratories (Chicago), Random House (Chicago) and experimental spaces throughout Chicago. Volk lives and works in Chicago, IL.
Grethell Rasúa graduated with a bachelor's Gold of the National Academy of Fine Arts San Alejandro in 2004 and the Instituto Superior de Arte (ISA) in the Faculty of Fine Arts in Havana, in 2009. She completed two years in the Department of Art Practice (2005-07), founded and directed by Tania Bruguera. In 2009 finished a Bachelor of Arts in PP.Sch. Cuba, attached to Columbus University of Veracruz, Mexico. She has had numerous exhibitions using different means of expression, audiovisual, video installations, performances, photographs, objects, environment, site specific and others. Her works have been displayed in museums, galleries, cultural centers, private residences, universities, video festivals in many countries including Cuba, Spain, Nicaragua, United States, Colombia, Mexico, Japan, Bolivia, Ecuador, Uruguay, Argentina, Brazil among others. As a curator she has curated several group and solo exhibitions. She has received several grants and residencies from Cuba, Spain and Britain. She currently works as a Specialist in Visual Arts at the Centre for the Development of Visual Arts (HADC) in Havana.
Latham Zearfoss is an artist and cultural producer living and working in Chicago. His artwork often centers on reclaiming historical and mythological texts, and revising them to incorporate radical notions of love and sex, possibility and probability. His commitment to art and activism has also manifested in the creation of sporadic, temporary utopias like Pilot TV and Chances Dances. He is also a contributing editor to the new online quarterly Monsters and Dust.
Manuel Alejandro Hernández Cardona received the name of Manuel Alejandro Hernández Cardona on September 10th 1986 in Cuba. Because of his parents relationship and the environment he lived at home, he grew up as a very shy, isolated, disoriented and resistant boy. This kind of attitudes will nurture his artwork later on.
When he was twenty-one years old he started to learn and discover the mechanism of domination and control used in his own country. Then he decided to take a stand and fight back the militarism. Everything changed when he realized that everything that he was doing was a result of the pressure of the powerful people. Now he has twenty-five years old, if you want to know exactly what he does? The best thing to do is ask him. |
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