Lot Essay
Central to Miguel Angel Rio's approach to art is his ongoing attempt to discover the influences of the Old World in the New World. The artist is constantly questioning our present time by conceptually building upon the legacy inherited from the pre-Columbian, Colonial and post-Colonial eras. His subject matter extends from a personal to the collective history of the people from the Andes.
In his work, as in Sin título (1993), Rios seeks to reveal the collisions which occur between the changing present and the constantly misinterpreted past. In it, he uses ordinary materials such as canvas, maps and photography to portray the presence of a post-industrial society embeded in the morals of a pre-industrial social frame. Sin título appears as a metaphor for the current social issues in South America, while inviting the viewer to re-look at the past, and see that it too is made up of multiple points of view, none of which excludes the other.
In his work, as in Sin título (1993), Rios seeks to reveal the collisions which occur between the changing present and the constantly misinterpreted past. In it, he uses ordinary materials such as canvas, maps and photography to portray the presence of a post-industrial society embeded in the morals of a pre-industrial social frame. Sin título appears as a metaphor for the current social issues in South America, while inviting the viewer to re-look at the past, and see that it too is made up of multiple points of view, none of which excludes the other.