Teresa Margolles
145 Kelvinhaugh Street
Glasgow Scotland G3 8PX
www.glasgowsculpturestudios.org
Production Residency AnnouncementTeresa Margolles (b. 1963 Culiacán, Mexico) who lives and works in Mexico City is undertaking her first residency in the United Kingdom at Glasgow Sculpture Studios (GSS) in Scotland where she is making new work over a three month period, alongside a community of 120 emergent, established and internationally recognised artists who are members of the organisation.
Margolles studied art and communication sciences at the National University of Mexico, followed by a diploma in forensic medicine. She is one of the founders of the group SEMEFO (Servicio Médico Forense/Forensic Medicine Service). Since belonging to SEMEFO, Margolles has chosen as her atelier, first the morgue and the dissecting room, and more recently, the violent streets of Mexico. These are places of death but also places which bear witness to social unrest. For the past two decades, Margolles has not so much worked directly with the remains of bodies but rather with the traces of life, with shrouds, burial and memory, and with the way a violent act shatters human networks and affects them on various levels.
Recent solo exhibitions include Frontera at Museion in Bolzano Italy 2011 and Kunsthalle Fridericianum in Kassel Germany 2010, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) Los Angeles California 2010, Recados postumous City Museum in Queretaro Mexico 2009, Galerie Peter Kilchmann Zurich 2009, In Lieu of Acts Anstelle der Tatsachen Kunsthalle Krems Austria 2008, Rubble Contemporary Art project Arcaute in Beijing China 2008 and 127 Bodies Kunstverein für die Rheinlande und Westfalen Dusseldorf 2006.
Margolles has presented work at Manifesta7 Bolzano 2008, the Liverpool Biennale 2006, the Prague Biennale 2005 and 2003 and the Gwangju Biennale 2004. In 2009 she represented Mexico at the 53rd Venice Biennale presenting What Else Could We Talk About?
Commissioned New Works
Margolles is working with a photographic archive she recovered of more than 4000 images taken in the seventies and eighties in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, by living photographer Luis Alvarado. Today, Juárez is infamous as the one of the murder capitals of the world. Margolles has been scanning, cataloguing and analyzing the negatives in order to—in her own words—”look at the past as a way of understanding the future.”
In parallel, Margolles’ initial site visit to Glasgow coincided with the riots in England and the days of social and political unrest that followed. Margolles travelled to London to document the aftermath. These photographic records and the debris collected from the streets will form the basis of a body of new work created using GSS production facilities and be the first exhibition in our new premises, The Whisky Bond.
Margolles’ new work aims to reflect on the idea that all places have a story of suffering etched into their past.
Curated Public Programme
Margolles’ new commission is part of GSS’ critically acclaimed public programme of which includes production and research residencies, curated exhibitions of new work, talks, symposia, off-site and artist-led projects and events, alongside professional development, education and community engagement programmes.
Production Residencies are awarded to nationally and/or internationally recognised artists for whom a change of scenery might offer fresh inspiration. They provide the artist/s with a dedicated studio and access to all Artists Facilities and Artists Support Programmes with a view to realising a major project or body of work that is disseminated as part of the Public Programme in the GSS galleries.
Since the inauguration of the Production Residency programme GSS have invited Beagles & Ramsay (2008–09) Siobhán Hapaska (2009–10) Jimmie Durham (2010) and Christine Borland (2010-11) and co-commissioned new work with a wide range of national and international partners and funders including Creative Scotland, Henry Moore Foundation and Glasgow International Festival of Visual Art. This programme is curated by Amy Sales, Head of Programme.
Margolles is represented by LABOR Mexico City and Peter Kilchmann Zurich.
If you wish to find out more about the above, please contact Louise Briggs, Programme Co-ordinator via louise@glasgowsculpturestudios.org
