Venice. The Mexican Betsabeé Romero (1963) exposes The Endless Spiral (The endless spiral), presented by the Museo di Arte Latino Americano (Molaa) of Long Beach, as part of the Collateral Event of the 60th International Art Exhibition of the Bienal di Venezia, from April 20 to September 1, at the Bevilacqua la Masa Foundation in San Marcos Square, with free entry. The exhibition is curated by Argentine Gaby Urtiaga and will be exhibited at the Californian museum later.
It is an exhibition with a strong visual impact that exposes six site-specific installations, made by the artist this year, around migration and borders, themes that Romero has explored since Ayate Car (1997), in the famous exhibition Insite97 in Tijuana.
In interview for The Conference, Romero explains that the exhibition in Venice arose from a conversation between his collectors and the director of Molaa, a museum that collects his work. “They cared that I was part of the official selection of the Biennial, having to compete among a thousand projects from all over the world, and only 30 were chosen, including ours.
I consider migration to be the most important phenomenon of our time, although politics tries to minimize it and demonize migrants.
In the rooms a line runs that fractures the entire space. The first installation is Sesigns that we likeineven towards exilewhich forms a rhombus from which he cut out the silhouettes of a family of migrants, inspired by the shadow theater of the East, ideally freeing them, since Signs on California highways warn drivers to avoid hitting them, as if they were animals that could suddenly jump on them and damage their cars.
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In Sharp walls, Romero represents a red scar, composed of shoe lasts and led, that resemble the spikes of our northern border, one of the most lethal in the world. “Its outline – he says – can be recognized even with your eyes closed, although the phenomenon is global.”
One of the most enveloping rooms is Identityan installation in a red space full of round concave mirrors, each marked by a border line that the artist conceives as a social rupture that affects families and the very identity of people.
The work Feathers of a spiral dawn, which titles the exhibition, is a visual song of hope, formed by half circles of colored feathers. Along with the installation Trubber rolling items With gold decorations of motifs from ancient American art, they represent the triumph of indigenous culture over centuries of submission and violence.
The artist aims to make migration visible with a national and international trajectory. She hopes that her work will lead to a slower and deeper reflection on the mark that borders leave on us, questioning the extent to which we are hurt by separations, the dividing lines of acceptance or denial in any territory, intimate or geopolitical.