Project Description

Through this project I focus on drawing the speculative route that Nancy Holt, Robert Smithson, and Virginia Dwan may have followed during their journey in the south of Mexico in 1969. From this trip remains the photographic record of the installations in Yucatán (Mirror displacements), Chiapas (Hotel Palenque) and an article published in Artforum. On one hand I find it interesting to visit and record the actual views of the sites, that in contrast with the artist’s narration may dialogue in matters of time transformations of the landscape, and the context of the time they were made. As the exact route isn’t clear, I propose to wander on the dérive as the method to walk erratically between two points, keeping close to the locations that are mapped in Smithson’s article.

Biography

José Luis Arroyo-Robles is an artist and researcher based in Mexico. He received an Art and Design Bachelor’s Degree at the UNAM, and is currently pursuing a Master's Degree in Advanced Design at the School of Architecture of the UMSNH. In 2021 he completed the Photographic Production Seminar at the Image Center in Mexico City. His work has been awarded at the Biennial of Contemporary Art BARCO and the Portfolio reviews of the International Photography Festival in Mexico. Currently, he co-directs Aberrante, a space for contemporary art that has won grants from the Contemporary Art Board and the Jumex Contemporary Art Foundation.