Two Exhibitions by Felipe Dulzaides in Chicago
The prestigious Graham Foundation, in Chicago, presents (since April 30 till July 17) the exhibition Utopía Posible, by Felipe Dulzaides.
Utopía Posible explores the history of the unfinished National Art Schools in Havana, which were commissioned by Fidel Castro and Che Guevara in 1961 and designed by Ricardo Porro, Vittorio Garatti, and Roberto Gottardi. Together, the schools were conceived as an art center that would symbolize and give form to the socialist ideals ushered in by the Cuban Revolution, but construction was abruptly halted in 1965. Although Porro's and Garatti's buildings were essentially finished, the project was halted for four decades. A new effort to restore and complete the complex began in 1999. In 2003, it was added to the Tentative List of UNESCO World Heritage sites. The history of this project continues to fascinate.
Felipe was born in the same year the National Arts School project was shut down, and studied Theater at this school in the eighties.
The centerpiece of Utopía Posible focuses on Roberto Gottardi and his quest to finish the School of Dramatic Arts, a process that led him to develop four different schemes. The exhibition also features two video pieces: Next Time It Rains, about Garatti's School of Ballet, which was 90 percent complete in 1965 but never occupied and left to be overgrown by jungle; and Broken Glass, about Porro's School of Dance, the first building of the complex to be completed during initial construction. Together, these works shows another dimension to this unique story of intense creativity and experimental architecture.
At the same time, Excelencias on-line art gallery, http://galeriaexcelencias.com/, exhibits this month nine artworks of Dulzaides. The exhibition includes photographs, installations, prints and public art proposals that explore different perspectives of his bicultural experience (resides between Havana and San Francisco, California). Each work is a poetic reflection on an event, encounter or peculiar image, often based on observation and detailed examination of the environments that are familiar to him, filled with many contradictions to themselves and to the other.
Felipe Dulzaides (Cuba, 1965) is a visual artist whose work spans photography, installation, performance, video, and public art. Dulzaides' work has been exhibited at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien (Berlin), Redcat (Los Angeles), and Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (San Francisco), among other venues. He is the recipient of prestigious awards including, the Cintas Fellowship 2001, the Creative Work Fund 2004 - 2005 and the 2010 Rome Prize. Dulzaides studied drama at the Instituto Superior de Arte and holds a Master of Fine Arts in New Genres from San Francisco Art Institute.
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