Sylvia Palacios Whitman: To Draw a Line with the Body

Opening on June 7, Art at Americas Society presents the first solo exhibition in the United States dedicated to artist Sylvia Palacios Whitman (b. Osorno, Chile, 1941). 

Featuring six decades of performance and works on paper, Sylvia Palacios Whitman: To Draw a Line with the Body highlights the artist’s key contributions to the downtown avant-garde of the 1970s and demonstrates the fundamental connection between drawing and performance in her practice.

Palacios Whitman relocated to New York in 1961, where she became involved in the city’s burgeoning experimental art scene, performing in venues such as The Kitchen and Idea Warehouse. Palacios Whitman sometimes refers to her performances as making “images,” wherein she utilizes performers and props to enact visual tableaus. Beginning her artistic process by drawing sketches, the artist creates short performances which focus on exaggerated movements or modify routine gestures. In Green Hands, for example, Palacios Whitman performs a series of lyrical movements with her arms accentuated by wearing oversized green gloves that the artist constructed out of paper.

Palacios Whitman’s work turns everyday scenes into performance art, expanding the boundaries of what fine art can be. Often, Palacios Whitman recreates specific memories from her childhood in southern Chile, or personal experiences of living in the United States far from her home. By using autobiographical material, the artist adds another layer of meaning to her work that engages with the emotional registers of memory. Sylvia Palacios Whitman: To Draw a Line with the Body celebrates the artist’s innovative visual and choreographic language as well as the continued experimental spirit of her artwork to the present day.

The exhibition is co-curated by Aimé Iglesias Lukin and Rachel Remick.

The presentation of Sylvia Palacios Whitman: To Draw a Line with the Body is made possible by generous support from the Jacques and Natasha Gelman Foundation, and by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs and New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature. Additional support is provided by the Ministry of Cultures, Arts, and Heritage of Chile. 

Americas Society acknowledges the generous support from the Arts of the Americas Circle contributors: Amalia Amoedo, Almeida e Dale Galeria de Arte, Estrellita B. Brodsky, Virginia Cowles Schroth, Emily A. Engel, Diana Fane, Isabella Hutchinson, Carolina Jannicelli, Diana López and Herman Sifontes, Antonio Murzi, Gabriela Pérez Rocchietti, Vivian Pfeiffer, Phillips, Erica Roberts, Sharon Schultz, and Edward J. Sullivan.

To learn more about the related programs or register to attend, please visit our website.

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