Woodcut Prints from the Talleres of ASARO
Transcription
Woodcut Prints from the Talleres of ASARO
Woodcut Prints from the Talleres of ASAROAsamblea de Artista Revolucionarios de Oaxaca Libros Latinos 2141 Mission St., Suite 301 San Francisco, CA 94110 www.libroslatinos.com [email protected] 415.503.1800 About ASARO The workshop for ASARO, Espacio Zapata: ¿QUÉ ES ESPACIO ZAPATA? Pensamos que todos tenemos el derecho de expresar a través de las diversas manifestaciones artísticas la denuncia de lo inhumano de estes sistema capitalista.... El arte es un potente medio de expresión y pensamos que todos deben de tener la opotunidad de desarrollar su capacidad creativa. Sea que uno piense en cerámica, teatro, figuras de madera, cocina, pintura o música, se ha demostrado a través de los siglos en las diversas obras históricas, en Oaxaca del 2006 se vivieron de los hechos más importantes en la historia contemporánea de México, una colvulsión social que renovó la capacidad creativa y fue “en las calles”, sin olvidar la participación de otros sectores en pintas, grabados y carteles, en canciones de protesta, en monigotes y hasta en figuras de rábanos para mostrar el rostro del pueblo oprimido por la dictadura burguesa. Ahí nace la Asamblea de Artista Revolucionarios de Oaxaca, o ASARO, que a dos años de haberse creado, ahora impulsa el Espacio Zapata. Aunque vemos que la calle continua teniendo este papel, Espacio Zapata surge a partir de varias necesidades, y una problemática que es la “no visibilización” de las expresiones artísticas que “atentan contra la cultura dominante”, donde la mayoría de los artistas creadores se subordinan al capital (produciendo arte como mercancía), donde el intelectual bajo su ropaje de creador “libre” e “individual” sepulta la crítica ante los hechos sociales (¿el por qué de la pobreza, de la explotación, la criminalización de la lucha social, la violación de los derechos humanos, etc, incluso llegando al cinismo de justificar los hehcho?). Oaxaca Now by thea liberty nichols Oaxaca Now: Young Radical Printmakers Marwen 833 N. Orleans, Chicago, IL 60610 April 9, 2010 - May 17, 2010 Snaking around Marwen’s glittering glass and steel second floor gallery hangs a staggering array of visceral black and white woodblock prints on paper created by Asamblea de Artistas Revolucionarios de Oaxaca (Assembly of Revolutionary Artists of Oaxaca). Best known by their Spanish-language acronym ASARO, the amorphous collective of artists was forged in the crucible of social and political unrest of Oaxaca, the biggest and one of the poorest, cities of the eponymous state, located in the south of Mexico, at the foothills of the Sierra Madre’s southern end. In May 2006, the massive annual teachers’ strike held in Oaxaca City’s zocalo, or central plaza, was met with unprecedented aggression and arrests. In June, an ad hoc coalition of over 300 hundred organizations joined forces with the striking teachers, calling themselves the Asamblea Popular del Pueblo de Oaxaca (Popular Assembly of the Peoples of Oaxaca) or APPO. United, they demanded the resignation of Governor Ulisis Ruiz, who responded by sending a one thousand-strong force of police officers to break up protestors. Months passed, and the conflict escalated from its previously largely symbolic show, to a violent and deadly clash that left 18 people dead. Wednesday November 1, 2006, Noon, Corner of Reforma y Independencia. Photograph courtesy Hank Tusinski. Oaxaca Now: Young Radical Printmakers, Marwen’s version of this relatively well traveled grouping of works (having hung in various iterations at Front Gallery in Oakland, California, Common Wealth Gallery in Madison, Wisconsin, Misericordia University, Dallas, Pennsylvania and Espacio Zapata in Oaxaca) opens with an equally moving photograph of the handful of artists who would come to form ASARO constructing their first collective work, a tapete, or sand painting, at the steel-toed boot tips of the aforementioned police officers, seen above. A customary Day of the Dead memorial tradition, this particular tapete, made from sand and marigold petals, featured a portrait of Governor Ruiz in black (being stenciled by the person in red in the photograph) with the word asescino (murderer) below it. ASARO’s overwhelming industriousness has resulted in scores of prints over their four year existence, many of which have also appropriated and re-imaged other customary or popular Mexican graphic iconography, such as the silk screened APPO lottery cards, seen at left. The silk screens however, are somewhat of an outlier; ASARO chiefly prints using woodblocks cut from cheap three-ply sub-flooring. Sometimes cut using wood cutting printers tools, and sometimes with exacto knives and razor blades, the images are printed on inexpensive chalk white blotter paper, with the resulting images pressed in a bold black contrast that emphasizes the gouges, grooves and grain of the woodblocks themselves. Most prints are pulled from an antiquated steel roller printing press, but some smaller images impressions are pulled from hand-burnished blocks. ASARO’s strong collective spirit manifests itself in the unsigned, unattributed works in the show. The anonymity of the artists is also a necessity; before they graced the walls of galleries these underground guerrilla works were being wheat pasted to the walls and buildings of occupied Oaxaca. In their present elegant and ordered locale on Marwen’s walls, ASARO’s prints also still remain largely untitled. They have become alienated through their elevation to high art from their stickered and spray paint-stenciled siblings, images of which can be found online, such as the agitprop portrait of 1910 Mexican Revolution hero Emiliano Zapata as a Mohawked, pierced ear punk. Just as Governor Ruiz is literally demonized, historical icons, such as Zapata and Benito Juárez, are idolized Conventional subject matter, such as calavera, or skulls, appear in a whole host of ASARO prints on view, in part influenced by the work of another famous Mexican printmaker, José Guadalupe Posada. The symbolically charged image of corn also crops up in many works on view, such as the spectacularly concise No Pais Sin Maiz, or No Country Without Corn, seen below. The simple slogan, dramatic and varied mark making, and bold larger then life imagery drives the pointed rallying cry home with firm sincerity. Some junior members of the collective, under the tutelage of more advanced and skilled printers, employ equally emblematic calls to arms. This was demonstrated by the well-designed composition of La Tierra Es De Quien La Trabaja OPPA (The earth belongs to those who work it), despite disfiguring amateur oversights like the reverse type of APPO at the bottom, a result of neglecting to account for the mirror image created by the printing process. The full range of ASARO’s creative process on view reveals the development of their artistic achievements and is well suited to the educational environment that Marwen contextualizes the exhibition within. As their individual and institutional collectors grow in number (The Fowler Museum and the Center for the Study of Political Graphics, both in Los Angeles, along with the Voices and Choices Gallery at Kutztown University’s Rohrbach library have folios of their prints in their permanent collections) ASARO’s international reputation also grows. How their move from city plaza to white cube impacts their practice is still unfolding, but their commitment to an accessible, activist art is built into their very mission statement, which mandates that change is necessary and that artists should feel compelled to contribute to that change using the tools of their trade. -Thea Liberty Nichols The press in Espacio Zapata Las Protestas de 2006 Sea que uno piense en cerámica, teatro, figuras de madera, cocina, pintura o música, se ha demostrado a través de los siglos en las diversas obras históricas, Protestas 1 en Oaxaca del 2006 se vivieron de los hechos más importantes en la historia contemporánea de México, una colvulsión social que renovó la capacidad creativa y fue “en las calles” Protestas 2 sin olvidar la participación de otros sectores en pintas, grabados y carteles, en canciones de protesta, en monigotes y hasta en figuras de rábanos para mostrar el rostro del pueblo oprimido por la dictadura burguesa. Protestas 3 Protestas 4 Protestas 5 Protestas 6 Protestas 7 Protestas 8 Protestas 9 Protestas 10 Protestas 11 Protestas 12 Protestas 13 Protestas 14 Protestas 15 Protestas 16 “We seek to initiate an artistic movement where the final goal is direct contact with people in the streets and in public spaces.” –This quote and those to follow from Bilingual Interview with ASARO: Revolutionary Artists From Oaxaca by HIMC Radio Collective Saturday, Jun. 07, 2008 Presos Políticos Presos 1 Confronted with the irrationality of government and its oppresive forms of sustaining itself in power, ASARO looks to create images that synthesize the critical force that is born in the periphery, in the barrios, the pueblos, and in youth. Presos 2 Presos 3 Presos 3 Presos 4 Presos 5 Maíz Trangénico Maíz 1 Maíz 2 Maíz 3 Maíz 4 Maíz 5 Maíz 6 Maíz 7 Maíz 8 Maíz 9 “ASARO manifests itself in favor of inclusion and of the fight to generate new rules of social participation and a profound change in the conscience of Oaxacans. We are an artistic movement and a movement for the remaking of the rules of the political game.” Maíz 10 Maíz 11 Maíz 12 Maíz 13 Zapata Zapata 1 Zapata 2 Zapata 3 Zapata 4 (/Protestas 17) Zapata 5 Zapata 6 Zapata 7 Petróleo Petroleo 1 Petroleo 2 Petroleo 3 Petroleo 4 Petroleo.5 Petroleo 6 Petroleo 7 Las muertas de Juárez Muertas 1 Muertas 2 Muertas 3 Muertas 4 Muertas 5 Muertas 6 Muertas 7 Muertas 8 Muertas 9 Muertas 10 “ASARO seeks to create consciousness and to generate ideas which help to consolidate a contemporary ideology, one which has as its core humanistic values, in order to break the schemes imposed by the system and to generate a society free of alienation and a revolutionary art” Muertas 11 Muertas 12 Muertas 13 Migración This latest series from ASARO was released in February 2011. Migración 2 Migración 3 Migración 4 “We believe that public art (in all its diverse artistic disciplines) is a form of communication that allows a dialogue with all sectors of society and which makes possible the visualization of the real conditions of existence—the norms and contradictions of the society which we all inhabit.” Migración 5 Migración 6 Migración 7 Migración 8 Migración 9 Migración 10 Migración 11 Migración 12 Migración 13 Migración 14 Migración 15 Migración 16 Migración 1 Two-tone Fighter Two-tone Hammer Mexican Roots Cultura Afro-Mexicana Afro 1 *Other prints related to Afro-Mexican Culture available Afro 2 Afro 3 Afro 4 Afro 5 Afro 6 APPO 1 Benito Juarez Calavera Helicoptero La Huelga *Two large posters Assorted Posters* *From events, openings, galleries, etc. Pricing: Full Libros Latinos Collection: $4,500 The collection in SF includes all of the sets, including the Temas Mixtos, with the exception of Migración of which Migración 1 and 12 are included. (63 pints are: 14 lg. white, 5 sm. white, 19 lg. grey, 22 sm. grey and 3 lg two-tone) Paper: Prints may be delivered on a white art paper or a medium weight grey rag paper. The librarians who we have shown the paper to so far have strongly favored the white paper for its durability and greater contrast for exhibit and copying. Individual Prints: Large White Prints: $175 ea. Medium White Prints $140 ea. Small White Prints: $100 ea. Large Grey Prints: $75 Small Grey Prints: $50 Large Two-Tone Prints (Afro 1, Zapata 2, Benito Juarez 1): $200 Medium Two-Tone Prints (Migración 15): $150 Small Two-Tone prints (Fighter/Hammer): $100 La Huelga (2 Lg. Prints): $350 Posters: $50 ea. (Assorted) Collections (White/Grey): Migración: $1500/$750 (16 Prints) Muertas: $1850/$975 (13 Prints) Maíz: $1850/$975 (13 Prints) Protesas: $2,050/$1,025 (16 Prints) Petróleo: $950/$475 (7 Prints) Presos: $550/$275 (5 Prints) Zapata: $575/$275 (5 Prints) There are more afro-mexican culture prints available. If interested please contact us. Discounts: Order 5-10 Prints, 10% Discount 11+ Prints, 20% Discount Sizing: The large size is approx: 39x29 in. though many of the “small” prints are printed on the full size paper. Small