Exhibit “Contingent Beauty: Contemporary Art from Latin America” on view until February 28, 2016

Date/Time
Nov. 22, 2015 to Feb. 28, 2016

Location
Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
1001 Bissonnet St
Houston, TX 77005

WHAT: Exhibit – “Contingent Beauty: Contemporary Art from Latin America”

WHEN: Sunday, November 22, 2015 to Sunday, February 28, 2016

WHERE: Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
Law Building, Second Floor
1001 Bissonnet St.
Houston, TX 77005

MORE INFO: http://www.mfah.org/exhibitions/contingent-beauty-contemporary-art-latin-america/

Contingent Beauty: Contemporary Art from Latin America features a selection of major works by 21 established artists from Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Cuba, Mexico, and Venezuela. Encompassing a variety of media including drawing, sculpture, video, and interactive object- and video-based installations, the exhibition highlights contemporary artists who use seductive and engaging materials to convey their social, political, and environmental concerns.

Drawn primarily from the Museum’s permanent collection of modern Latin American art—one of the most comprehensive collections of its kind in any public institution—nearly all of the 32 works on view have been acquired by the Museum over the last five years through the Caribbean Art Fund, established in 2010 as a special initiative of the Museum and Fundación Gego. The goal of this fund is to research, promote, and collect the work of artists from the greater Caribbean.

The exhibition also features work by exceptional mid-career Latin American artists, generating a dynamic dialogue that cuts across chronological and geographic borders. Contingent Beauty intertwines aesthetic refinement with biting critiques of timely issues grounded in the complex realities of Latin America and its long history of colonization, political repression, and economic crisis. These issues range from poverty, violence, gender, government corruption, and globalization, to the war on drugs and the legacy of colonialism.

The “beauty” of these works is contingent upon contextual interpretation. Each piece harbors a tension between opposing elements, such as beauty and violence, seduction and repulsion, or elegance and brutality. Among the artists represented are Tania Bruguera (Cuba), María Fernanda Cardoso (Colombia), Los Carpinteros (Cuba), Grupo Mondongo (Argentina), Guillermo Kuitca (Argentina), Miguel Ángel Rojas (Colombia), Javier Téllez (Venezuela), and Tunga (Brazil).

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Tags: December 2015, Exhibits, February 2016, January 2016, Museum of Fine Arts Houston, November 2015