Museo Jumex presents a solo project by Mario García Torres. Produced in response to the temporary closure of cultural institutions and abrupt changes to artists’ production as a result of the current pandemic, García Torres will occupy a vacant gallery in the museum throughout June, making use of the space as private studio to create new work, that will result in an exhibition for a single visitor.
The process becomes a means for the artist to reconsider the relationship between artist, studio, public and institution during the current hiatus from global exhibitions. Throughout the project, a live stream of the space will be visible from the museum’s webpage as a central component in the museum’s program, with further content including video interviews, digital publications and education activities centred around the artist to explore the themes.
García Torres’s projects frequently draw from contemporary art history, particularly post-minimalism and conceptualism that challenged institutions and have since become part of the institutional canon. In Solo, the artist references, and in some ways inverts, existing themes of gallery closures, dust in art, and poured paintings. It also refers to artists’ retreats and residencies, and a traditional, romantic image of the artist working alone in their studio. By occupying a space within a contemporary art museum as his own, these notions will be explored both through research and making during the unexpected period of reflection on the current and future conditions.
Mario García Torres: Solo is part of the Museo Jumex’s online program entitled Museo en casa established in response to the museum’s temporary closure during the Coronavirus pandemic. García Torres was invited to produce the project as a means to continue the museum’s work with artists during this period, and as an opportunity to open up a dialogue about the impact on cultural institutions that the pandemic has exposed.