Patricia Esquivias

Venezuelan-born artist Patricia Esquivias creates videos that weave found images, history, and personal anecdotes into narratives that convey her insights about contemporary culture. Esquivias acts as narrator in these vignettes, in which she presents clips from videos and magazines, photos, drawings, and other small objects. The camera is often trained on Esquivias’s laptop and the gallery visitor sees only her hands scrolling through digital images, playing videos, and inserting physical pictures as she speaks. Her monotone voice and meandering style of storytelling belie the significant planning and intention that she puts into presenting her paired subjects, which have included Julio Iglesias and King Philip II, Spanish raves and an associate of Francisco Franco, as well as herself and the artist Susan Brown. The connections that Esquivias creates in her videos are often idiosyncratic and difficult to locate, offering the viewer an opportunity for contemplation and discovery.
 
Biography

Patricia Esquivias was born in 1979 in Caracas, Venezuela and now lives in Madrid, Spain. She received her BA from Central Saint Martins College of Art in Design in London in 2001 and her MFA from California College of the Arts in San Francisco in 2007. Esquivias has won awards including the EAST International Award (2007) and residencies at Skowhegan, Madison (2006); Wiels Contemporary Art Centre, Brussels (2010); and Akademie Schloss Solitude, Stuttgart (2011). Her work has been presented in one-person exhibitions at Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid (2009); and Midway Contemporary Art, Minneapolis (2009). Esquivias has also been included in numerous group exhibitions including Video Art: Replay, Institute of Contemporary Art Philadelphia (2009); Report on Probability, Kunsthalle Basel, Basel (2009); 5x5Castelló09, Espai d’art contemporani de Castelló, Castellon de la Plana (2009); The Generational: Younger Than Jesus, New Museum, New York (2009); Wrinkles in Time, Instituto Valencia de Arte Moderna, Valencia (2009); Bending the Word, Matrix 226, Berkeley Museum of Art, Berkeley (2008); When Things Cast No Shadow – 5th Berlin Biennial for Contemporary Art, Berlin (2008); and Beyond Paradise, Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (2008).

Pressetext

KünstlerInnen: Patricia Esquivias