The Art of Sofía Acosta Varea (La Suerte)
Yesterday, KAIROS brought you an interview with Sofía Acosta Varea. Today, we bring you a sample of her work.
CACAÑAN (A Crappy Road)
Sometimes it’s good to see so much crap running around town.
- Take water from the Machángara River.
- Mix this water with yellow paint.
- Mark a line of painting from Machángara to the gallery.
The tour was a political action, seeking to reveal so much crap in the city, both real and symbolic; crap of all kinds. Using the Machángara, a river that runs through the city of Quito and ends in the Guayllabamba; its waters stagnate in a large hydroelectric dam, Manduriacu, also known as the “cacacocha”.
I use Machángara, a river that we want to ignore, as a multiple reference, as what we don’t want to see, what we cover up and hide in the city. I walk making a parody of hygiene and cleanliness, gentrification and order of the city.
MIRADOR: Visions on Extractivism (Ecuador 2007-2017)
The editorial project Mirador: Visions on Extractivism (Ecuador 2007 – 2017), is a publication by Sofía Martina and Adrian Balseca, with text by Alejandra Santillana Ortiz. This consists of an investigation into the different visual memories of peasant and Indigenous leaders who have been criminalized since the entry of the 6 mega-mining projects in Ecuador. The territories where the mining projects are located correspond to four provinces of Ecuador: Llurimagua in the province of Imbabura; Loma Larga and Río Blanco tin Azuay; Fruta del Norte and Mirador in Zamora Chinchipe; and finally Panantza San Carlos in Morona Santiago.
The research is presented as a printed publication, as an album that collects various visual approaches to these files and documents, as a different way of expanding the problem. Through judicial files, testimonies, personal records and photographs of the communities, this publication introduces us to a socio-political scenario. Sensibly recognizing the specificities of the criminalization of community leaders, the publication collects the cases that have been relevant in the fight against mega-mining in the last twenty years.
Portraits of Confinement
This publication contains four testimonies of victims who were confined in rehabilitation centers where torture, forced confinement and other serious violations of human rights occurred. The book published by the Taller de Comunicación Mujer, is published with the support of Astraea, an association that works for gender justice that supports groups in Latin America and contains illustrations from La Suerte.
Mirador Project // Open pit in three phases
Commissioned work for: Landscape / Territory of the Jungle in the Visual Arts
“The universe of works of art in Ecuador that allude to the jungle is vast. We have chosen to choose pieces that, from an artistic sensibility, have questioned the most common forms of representation, although over the years they have resulted in a new convention. A fundamental criterion was to include artists who have approached the jungle to highlight its value critically, in addition to considering it a vital place in their career. The curatorship does not try to harmonize the friction between the different ways of seeing the jungle, but to give them context, and to highlight the heterogeneity of the means used to look, represent and be in this space ” (Ana Rosa Valdéz, Exhibition Curator).
