The Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) Hosts Cuban Artist Carlos Garaicoa

Monday, 13 November 2006 12:45

Philadelphia, PA – The Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA) is pleased to present “Carlos Garaicoa,” the first U.S. survey of recent work by Cuban artist Carlos Garaicoa, who addresses Cuba’s politics and ideologies through the examination of modern architecture.  Presenting a selection of new works created specially for the exhibition, “Carlos Garaicoa” opens in ICA’s second-floor galleries on January 20 through March 25, 2006.  Organized by the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Associate Curator Alma Ruiz, “Carlos Garaicoa” features 12 works that use architectural models, renderings, drawings, videos, and photographs to articulate the failed outcome of social and architectural programs in Cuba.

Adopting the city of Havana as his laboratory, Garaicoa has been working since the early 1990s using a multidisciplinary approach that includes architecture and urbanism, narrative, history, and politics.  His works are charged with provocative commentary on issues such as architecture’s ability to alter the course of history, the failure of modernism as a catalyst for social change, and the frustration and decay of 20^th-century utopias. 

Garaicoa was born in Havana, Cuba in 1967 where he currently lives and works.  He studied thermodynamics at the Instituto Hermanos Gomez and studied visual arts at the Instituto Superior de Arte in Cuba from 1989 to 1994.  Although never formally trained as an architect, he has been an active observer of architecture and has applied this discourse to his artwork.  In his work, Garaicoa explores the sociological and psychological impact of utopian spaces.  He investigates notions of idealized societies in “Campus o la Babel del conocimiento (Campus or the Babel of Knowledge),” 2002-04, a sculpture of an eerie yet beautiful university campus and building.  Despite its highly structured and technologically advanced environment, the building is a place of confusion rather than a temple of higher learning.  “La habitacion de mi negatividad (II) (The Room of My Negativity (II),” 2004 is a video installation that revisits some of the artist’s reflections on failed utopias previously explored in “The Room of My Negativity (I),” 2003, and “Because Every City Has the Right to Be Called Utopia,” 2002 is a large-scale wall drawing of an architectural structure made with thread and pins.

Interested in urban planning and a city’s architectural social fabric, Garaicoa often illustrates his vision in large installations using various materials such as crystal, wax candles, and rice-paper lamps.  One such installation is “De la serie Nuevas arquitecturas (From the series New Architectures),” 2003, a floating, futuristic-looking city consisting of 76 rice-paper lamps gathered in clusters.  Softened by the density of the white rice paper, the glowing lights project a fictionalized vision of a city that contrasts with the reality of urban centers around the world.

Garaicoa’s work has been featured in solo and group exhibitions, including Art in General, New York; Arts TeorETICA, San José, Costa Rica; Biblioteca Luis Angel Arango, Bogotá; The Bronx Museum of the Arts; Castello di Rivoli, Turin; Centro Wilfredo Lam and Fundación Ludwig de Cuba, Havana; Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston; Kunsthalle, Vienna; Museo de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid; and Vancouver Art Gallery. He has participated in the V, VI, and VII Bienales de La Habana; XXIV and XXVI Bienais de Sao Paulo, Brazil; Documenta XI, Kassel, Germany; 1997 Kwangju Biennale, South Korea; Sonsbeek 9, Arnhem, Holland; and I Yokohama Triennial, Japan.  He has also participated in the 2005 Venice Biennale.

Institute of Contemporary Art

Founded in 1963, the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania is a leader in the presentation and documentation of contemporary art. Through exhibitions, commissions, educational programs, and publications, ICA invites the public to share in the experience, interpretation and understanding of the work of established and emerging artists.  Visit : www.upenn.edu/ica/