Libia Castro
area: Visual Art
Key Facts
nationality
Spainarea
Visual Artresidence
Berlin (GER), Rotterdam (NED)recommending institution
freiraum quartier21 INTERNATIONALtime period
December 2013 - January 2014Solo exhibitions:
Asymmetry, TENT Art Centre, curated by Adam Budak, Rotterdam (2013). Two ongoing projects, Galerie Opdahl Berlín, (2012). Under Deconstruction, The National Gallery of Iceland, Reykjavik (2012). Tu país no existe, CAAC Sevilla, curated by Juan Antonio Alvarez, Sevilla (2011). Under Deconstruction, The Icelandic Pavilion, at 54th Venice Biennial, curated by Ellen Blumenstein, Venice (2011). Constitution of The Republic of Iceland, Hafnarborg Art Center, curated by Hanna Styrmisdottir, Hafnarfjordur (2011). Lobbyists, The Living Art Museum, curated by Birta Guðjónsdóttir, Reykjavík (2010). Libia Castro & Ólafur Ólafsson, Galleria Riccardo Crespi, curated by Gabi Scardi, Milano (2009). Everybody is doing what they can, Reykjavík's Contemporary Art Museum, curated by Hafþór Yngvason, Reykjavík (2008). Recent Works, Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin (2008). Libia Castro & Ólafur Ólafsson, CAC Málaga, Málaga (2007). Demolitions and Excavations, Galerie Martin van Zomeren, Amsterdam (2006). Wir wünschen Ihnen einen angenehmen Aufenthalt, De Appel CAC, curated by Theo Tegelaers, Amsterdam (2004). 20 minus minutes, Platform Garanti Contemporary Art Center, Istanbul (2003).
Group exhibitions:
You Imagine What You Desire, 19th Biennial of Sydney (2014). Selected Artists, NGBK -Neue Gesellschaft fur Bildende Kunst, Berlin (2013). 8 ways to Overcome the Closed Circuit, Künstlerhaus Bremen, Bremen (2013). Long ago and not true anyway, waterside contemporary, London (2013). It's the Political Economy, Stupid, Center for Cultural Decontamination, Belgrade / Pori Art Museum, Pori and College of Architecture and the Arts University of Illinois at Chicago (2013). The Unexpected Guest, 7th Liverpool Biennial, Liverpool (2012). 'I Wish This Was A Song': Music in Contemporary Art, National Museum of Contemporary Art Oslo (2012). 'Forays. Systems of Self-Interest-Mechanisms of Looting' , Ratskeller – Galerie für zeitgenössische Kunst- Kunstraum Lichtenberg, Berlin (2012). Germans, speak German! CCA – Centre for Contemporary Arts Glasgow (2012). Terms of Belonging, Overgaden-ICA, Kopenhagen (2011). Detached- Artistic Positions on Networks of Power, ROTOR, Graz (2011). Acts of Refusal, Tartu Art House, Tartu (2011). Lobbyists, Vita Kuben, Umeå (2011). North by New York, Scandinavian House New York, New York (2011). La Vida en ningún lugar, Matadero Madrid, Madrid (2010). The People United Will Never Be Defited, TENT Arts Center Rotterdam (2010). Hors Pistes, Another Motion of Pictures, Centre Pompidou, Paris (2010). Ibrido, PAC Padiglione d ́Arte Contemporanea, Milano (2010). Il Ventre di Napoli, Palazzo delle Sperimentazioni, Fondazione Morra, Napoli (2010). Where Everything Is Yet to Happen, SPAPORT BIENNIAL, Banja Luka (2009). Favoured Nations, Momentum 5th Nordic Biennial of Contemporary Art, Moss (2009). Generosity is the new political, Wysing Art Centre, Cambridge (2009). Common History and its Private Stories, MUSA Museum auf Abruf, Vienna (2009). Prix de Rome, De Appel CAC Amsterdam (2009). Biennale Cuveé, The Biennial of Biennials, OK Center, Linz (2009). Invasion of Sound, Zacheta National Gallery of Art, Warsaw (2009). At your service, David Roberts Foundation Fitzrovia, London (2009). ”Principle Hope”, Manifesta 7- European Biennial of Contemporary Art, Rovereto (2008). Be(com)ing Dutch, Van Abbe Museum, Eindhoven (2008). Bæ bæ Ísland, Akureyri Art Museum (2008).
Residencies:
Rijksakademie for Visual Arts - Prix de Rome, Amsterdam, 01.01.2009 to 31.05.2009
Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, 10.01.2008 to 31.12.2008
Townhouse Gallery, Cairo, 01.07.2007 to 31.07.2007
IRP- Istanbul, International Residency Program, at Platform Garanti CAC, Istanbul 01.01.2003 to 30.06.2003
Foundation B.a.d, Rotterdam, 6 months, 2001
Straumur Artist Residency, Hafnarfjördur, 3 months, 2000
We'll be a.o working on two ongoing projects, Your Country Doesn't Exist (2003-ongoing) and ThE riGHt tO RighT/WrOnG (2012-ongoing) and prepearing work for the upcoming exhibition Places of Transition taking place at the MQ in Vienna, opening on the 23rd of January 2014.
Your country doesn’t exist, 2003 – ongoing.
Your Country Doesn’t Exist is an ongoing project and campaign, which started in 2003 in Istanbul, the beginning of which year was marked by global antiwar protests against the invasion of Iraq by the US and some of its allies. Since then, the project developed to include different media, forms and formats and it traveled the world spreading the message, “Your country doesn’t exist” in different languages; including billboards, TV, radio and newspaper advertisements, magazine covers, postage-stamps prototypes, drink cans, wall drawings, T-shirts, sculptures, performances, video works, posters, and outdoor public neon works to name a few.
ThE riGHt tO RighT/WrOnG (2012-ongoing)
The work ThE riGHt tO RighT/WrOnG is a new ongoing art project first commissioned by the 7th Liverpool Biennial (2012), under the title ThE riGHt tO RighT. After the 7th Liverpool Biennial the project continues unfolding and addressing the subject of ThE riGHt tO RighT and ThE riGHt tO WrOnG, in collaboration with other venues and people in different places. The project will develop as an artistic research into TRTR and TRTW allowing experimentation with different media, forms and formats and will partly behave taking the form of campaign.
For the 7th Liverpool Biennial (2012), The Unexpected Guest exhibition, Libia Castro & Ólafur Ólafsson launched the new project and campaign ThE riGHt tO RighT, with two iterations: a flashing neon sign that illuminates the City from the south facade of St George’s Hall, a neoclassical 19th century architectural, historical and symbolic landmark of Liverpool - which used to be a functioning court room with it’s adjacent prison cells (till 1980) and a ballroom/concert hall - holding still an important representative and symbolic function for official events and rituals of the community. And a free newspaper, distributed throughout the Biennial venues, in city libraries, cafes, bookshops, as an insert in the Liverpool Post and online.
The neon sign reads alternately ThE riGHt tO RighT and ThE riGHt tO WrOnG, and also introduces a new unspeakable word that blends RighT and WrOnG together. The newspaper features a newly commissioned text from British writer and philosopher Nina Power on ThE riGHt tO RighT/WrOnG, in dialogue with the artists. This text addresses the subject of ThE riGHt tO RighT and current global political unrest in a reflective and satirical manner, also confronting us with the paradoxes of a document such as The Universal Declaration of Human Rights by presenting us with ‘The Partial Declaration of Human Wrongs’.
Through this project and campaign, the artists assert that this fundamental right to right is the first step towards a real and communal socio-political emancipation: above and beyond the multitude of international conventions, declarations, protocols and constitutions that specify and regulate the rights that nation-states and transnational agencies have made available to, or withhold from, citizens. To read the newspaper online: <link http: libia-olafur.com right _blank external-link-new-window externen link in neuem>libia-olafur.com/right
