Oaxaca Now: Young Radical Printmakers
April 9-May 20, 2010

Untitled---Marwen's second-floor gallery---is host to Oaxaca Now: Young Radical Printmakers, featuring new woodcut prints and videos from the Asamblea de Artistas Revolucionarios de Oaxaca (ASARO). Part of the Mexico 2010 in Chicago celebration, this travelling exhibition arrives at Marwen with eleven new prints. In keeping with the collective's visually polemic tone, the new prints and video add breadth and depth to this traveling conversation on art, activism, and politics in Oaxaca today. The new work is for sale.

This exhibition is co-curated by Arielle Bielak and Professor Kevin McCloskey.

In Mexico, November 2 is best known as El Dia de los Muertos, or the Day of the Dead. It was on this day in 2006 that the politically charged artist collective Asamblea de Artistas Revolucionarios de Oaxaca was born. ASARO is comprised of individual artists ranging from 15-31 years old. Wielding printmaking skills taught to them by Mexican and Japanese master printers, the members of ASARO were compelled to action by teacher protests that escalated into civilian fatalities at the hands of the federal police. With ASARO's wheat-pasted prints and graffiti shouting their messages of protest up and down the streets, the world took notice of the collective and the situation.

Reviews of the exhibition:

http://www.artslant.com/chi/articles/show/16050

http://chicagoartmagazine.com/2010/04/oaxaca-now-at-marwens-untitled-gallery/

Contact: Arielle Bielak
abielak@marwen.org
312.944.2418 ext 206