PINK Ranchos and Other Ephemeral Zip Codes
Carolina Mayorga
Opening reception and performance
Thursday, February 14 6-8pm
Cambuche Party: A Pink Musical. Performance: 6:45pm
Participants: Juan Felipe Mayorga (musician/piano player), Daniela Zuluaga (performer), Carolina Mayorga (performer). Piano intervention by Alberto Gaitán.
Choza Artist Party
Featuring artists Maribeth Egan, Heloisa Escudero and Jessica Kallista
Thursday, March 21 6-8pm
Performance Art in Latin America
Conversation with Independent Curator Laura Roulet
Wednesday, April 17, 12-1pm
Square Foot Give Away: Community-based program with audience participation.
Saturday, May 11 2-4pm
RSVP for public programming is encouraged but not required
Organization of American States
Secretariat for Hemispheric Affairs
AMA | Art Museum of the Americas
201 18th Street NW
Washington DC 20006
“There is no transnational truth to color perception... It is society that 'makes' color, defines it and gives its meaning." -Michel Pastoureau
The Organization of American States (OAS) AMA | Art Museum of the Americas proudly presents PINK Ranchos and Other Ephemeral Zip Codes, an exhibition of new work by Colombian-American artist Carolina Mayorga, in dialog with AMA’s permanent collection. Through this series of interconnected works, Mayorga invites the audience to enter a PINK-mented reality and experience her bi-cultural interpretations of those living inside ranchos, cambuches, shelters and other ephemeral zip codes.
This site-specific multimedia project is the result of a year of artistic investigation on issues of home and homelessness and the artist’s infatuation with PINK. By applying the pigment to women and children (characters typically associated with home), memories of her native Colombia, 14 years of residency in Washington, DC and AMA’s permanent collection, she has created a pleasing environment to contrast the experiences of those living in exile, displacement, dislocation, relocation, and eviction.
Works in AMA’s collection by Ignacio Iturria, Eduardo Giusiano, Ricardo Supisiche, Rubens Gerchman, Amelia Peláez, Consuelo Gotay, Dora Ramírez, Roser Muntañola and Roberto Matta; as well as Beatriz Briceño’s interest in the color pink inform various components for the exhibition. The embellishing properties of the shade gild the space to create a world that provides acceptance, emotional gratification, and give fashionable and commercial value to provisional domiciles. Audio juxtaposes testimonials given to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights with visual gestures and dance moves. Mayorga’s study of the AMA collection comes from an interest in exploring works of artists that share her cultural background; she establishes historical and social connections with the works based on her conceptual and aesthetic concerns. The result is Mayorga’s appropriation and reexamination these works, juxtaposing her “PINK-ified” perspective on life inside ranchos y chozas as dictated by privation and abandonment.
The exhibition includes a series of public programs, among them Cambuche Party: A Pink Musical, which Mayorga describes as “a performance composed of three musical numbers inspired by life in cambuches, ranchos and other ephemeral zip codes. The most anticipated pink musical produced by interdisciplinary artist Carolina Mayorga will feature performers, musicians and artists of national and international reputation. After its world premiere at the Art Museum of the Americas, the musical will begin its international tour in Colombia in March, 2019.”
The artist’s first solo exhibition at the OAS, Tales of Death, took place in 2000 at the former AMA gallery in the OAS Hall of the Americas, and its opening reception featured the performance Sale! Sale! Sale!, inviting attendees to purchase “marked down” articles of clothing representing disappeared persons. She held a second OAS solo show, Love Me, Quiéreme, Buy Me, in 2010 in the OAS F Street Gallery. Her mixed-media work Untitled (2000) is part of AMA’s permanent collection, and has been exhibited on numerous occasions. She has participated in several group exhibitions at the AMA. PINK Ranchos and Other Ephemeral Zip Codes is the artist’s first solo exhibition in the AMA building.
Colombian-born and naturalized American citizen, has exhibited her work nationally and internationally for the last 20 years. Her work is part of national and international collections and has been reviewed in publications in South America, Europe and the US. Mayorga’s artwork addresses issues of social and political content. Comments on migration, war, identity, translate into video, performance, site-specific installations, and two-dimensional media in the form of photography and drawing. The artist lives and works in Washington, DC.
This exhibition is made possible by the generous support of the FAMA | Friends of the Art Museum of the Americas.
This project is supported by the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities, which receives support from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Accessibility: AMA’s first floor is wheelchair accessible by appointment, with a ramp that can be installed at the back entrance to the museum. There is a gravel pathway leading to the back entrance. There is one half-step leading from the first room into the first-floor galleries. There is a flight of winding stairs leading to the museum’s second floor. Restrooms are located on the second floor. For more information on accessibility, or to make an appointment to visit, please contact 202 370 0147 or [email protected]