Andrés Monzón-Aguirre
July 15th / 2021
Presentation topic:
On Identity, Material Culture and being White Mestize.
I would like to discuss the topic of miscegenation and how it complicates the prospect of indigenous identification for the mestize subject, contributing to the erasure of subjugated culture. I am an artist currently based in New York City making my work in Brooklyn and my native Medellin where I create what I consider to be origin-specific sculpture. I see myself as mestize and product of the Colombian Republic, where I grew up with a strong sense of belonging to a society that is constantly coming to terms with (if not resisting) the current and historic violence that stems from colonial expansion. In a sinister way, one of the results of the violence of colonization has been the creation of life itself; people like myself, the offspring of miscegenation and cultural rape, born into a history in which there is no escape from implication. My work is how I navigate questions of belonging as a product of the colonizer and colonized cultures, inevitably an impostor and bastardized by both. How do I grapple with my ruptured sense of self? What does cultural appropriation mean for me? These are questions I ask myself along the way.
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Andrés Monzón-Aguirre uses the mediums of painting, sculpture, and social practice to explore themes of diasporic and Latinx self-assertion through a queer lens. Their work is informed by art and iconography of the Americas, sociology, and queer theory. In sculpture they work predominantly with ceramics, formally citing historical objects of Tumaco-La Tolita and Quimbaya origin to talk about miscegenation and cultural erasure. Their two-dimensional work references iconic images of popular culture – often divas – and portraits of people in their social circles.
Monzón-Aguirre received an MFA from New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University (2019) and a BFA in painting from the Rhode Island School of Design (2009). They have been a resident artist with the Museo del Norte de Santander (Villa del Rosario, 2016) and Fundación Casa Tres Patios (Medellin, 2015). Amongst their awards are Apoyos Concertados Para el Arte y La Cultura, Medellin (2014), and an exhibition travel grant by the Prince Claus Fund (2013). Their work has been exhibited in the International Art Encounter MDE15 (Medellin, 2015), and twice at the Bienal de Bucaramanga (2015, 2020). Solo exhibitions include ‘Here Beyond’ (2019) at Fosdick-Nelson Gallery and ‘Sitting with Marta’ (2019) at the Terra Cotta Building in Alfred University, New York. Other recent exhibitions include ‘Figurative Works from the Master of Fine Arts Collection’ (2020) at the Alfred Ceramic Art Museum; ‘Salón de Ceramistas’ (2019) at the Chamber of Commerce, Medellin; and ‘VEILED’ (2018) at District Clay Gallery, Washington D.C. Monzón-Aguirre is also Founder Director of Fundación Campos de Gutiérrez, an organization of international scope that served diverse audiences from 2011 to 2019, facilitating educational and artistic projects, cultural exchange, and exhibition of artworks in Medellin.