QUEREMOS ROCK
Artemio
Pedro Reyes
Miguel Calderon
Marcela y Gina
Juan Luna-Avin
Yoshua Okon
Queen's Nails Annex is pleased to present Queremos Rock!, an exhibition exploring sub-cultural rock movements in Mexico City and their influence on contemporary culture. The show features artists from Mexico City including Miguel Calderon, ARTEMIO, Daniel Guzman, Marcelygina, Yoshua Okon, Juan Luna-Avin, and Pedro Reyes.
The focal point for a majority of the video, installation, and sculpture featured in Queremos Rock! is the cultural phenomenon of The Tianguis del Chopo a small public space in Mexico City, which serves as a weekly meeting place for Punk, Metal and Goth youth. Every Sunday the space becomes a marketplace for these subcultures - a place to trade and buy pirate clothing, decals, compact disks, vinyl records, handmade patches, head-bands and buttons, cult literature, magazines, concert posters and flyers for both past and up-incoming gigs.
The Tianguis started at the El Chopo Museum, which is operated by Mexico's largest university in a working-class shopping area of downtown Mexico City. The museum opened in 1980, with fine art exhibitions, courses and other cultural events. One such event was a punk-related exhibit in 1980, which prompted a spontaneous exchange of paraphernalia between rock and punk vendors, setting establishing an impromptu flea market on the street outside the museum. The Tianguis still flourishes by engaging in cultural and non-profit activities as a form of cultural resistance through original forms of piracy and reinterpretation.
Queremos Rock! features Miguel Calderon's, work entitled: Yepa Yepa,
Yepa!, an eclectic music video for Mexico City musician Silverio, known for
his cutting- edge performance-based electronic rock music , filmed at the
infamous Patrick Miller transvestite night club in Mexico City. Calderon
is the co-founder of La Panaderia, an alternative art space in Mexico City.
His work has been shown in internationally in such venues as Nacional
Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York,
São Paulo Bienal, Brazil and Andrea Rosen Gallery, New York.
New York Groove, by Daniel Guzman, is an unauthorized video for the 1980 song of the same name by Ace Frelley (of the American rock band Kiss), which visually replaces the setting of New York City with Mexico City. The video explores the influence of rock music within Guzman's artwork and he states, "When I first heard and saw a record of Kiss, Destroyer, (it was) a complete revelation for me, despite the fact that I didn't understand a word they sang, the music's energy and happiness touched me deep inside. From that moment on, Rock has been with me always, for better or worse, not only while I'm working but in my daily life, as a kind of bridge that has helped me during certain periods of my life to make emotional connections with people and the world, and has often served in their stead". His work has been shown at IL Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, Japan and Jumex, Collection, Mexico City and was included in QUOTIDIANO ALTERATO, curated by Gabriel Orozco, Venice Biennale, 2003.
Ginaymarcela, a collaborative group will present Calzones, a new project made especially for Queremos Rock!, which consist of 10 autographed and worn women's underwear signed by Mexican rock stars and displayed as rock memorabilia. The project explores the power relationship between audience, groupies and the celebrity of rock stars. Their work has been shown at Art Basel/Miami, Ex-Teresa, Mexico City, Bogotá Contemporary Art Museum, Colombia and will have their first solo exhibition at Queens Nails Annex in January of 2006.
For his series of photographs and videos entitled, New Group Theraples 1 (Guitars ) Pedro Reyes utilized El Chopo as his location and fabricated a series of sculptures in the shapes of electric guitars. Paired with a sound system and color background changed to reflect the style of the volunteer/performer, the opportunity for the ultimate air-guitar performance is given, with the cathartic ritual of smashing the guitar being the acme of every routine . New Group Theraples 1 ( Guitars ), examines violence as an exercise of style. His work has been shown at künstlerhaus bethanien/ Berlin, 2003 Venice Biennale, 2002 Shanghai Biennale, Shanghai, China and South London Gallery, London.
Yoshua Okon, a will present a new version of his video installation, Jedbanger, modifying it to incorporate sculptural elements. The original silent video was recorded at El Chopo and documents participants/rockers "head banging" to their favorite metal tracks through walkmen. The project focuses on the subculture of metal head bangers in Mexico City - examining the phenomena as a class and time-specific reference, it becomes an allusion to ancient transcendental practices. His work has been shown at The Project, New York/Los Angeles, Art and Public, Geneva, Switzerland, Barusa Art Gallery, Istanbul, Turkey and Galeria Enrique Guerrero, Mexico City.
Untitled (Chopiando), is a sculptural installation by Juan Luna-Avin which mimics El Chopo's vending stalls. For the exhibition, Luna-Avin has pirated his own collection of music and constructed vinyl 45 LP covers, creating a series of compilations such as Donde Te Agarro El Temblor? (Where Were you When the Earthquake Hit?), a collection of songs that commemorate the 15th anniversary of the deadly 1985 earthquake in Mexico City. His work has been exhibited Yerba Buena Center for The Arts in San Francisco, LACMA in San Jose and the UCLA Hammer Museum in Los Angeles.
ARTEMIO is exhibiting, ARTEMIO's Top 5 Rock Movies, is viewing station constantly playing favorite rock-based/metal movies. ARTEMIO's previous video work utilized appropriated Hollywood mainstream films, re-edited so that new multiple and latent narratives emerge from the films. His work has been featured at Museo de Arte Contemporáneo Carrillo Gil, México City, REDCAT Gallery, Los Angeles, CA, Chiesa di San Mateo, Lucca, Italy and 7th Biennial La Habana, Cuba.
