Contra todo autoridad…excepto mi mamá at Embajada

Artists: Lourdes Correa-Carlo, Marcelo Cidade, Chemi Rosado-Seijo, Jonathan Torres, André Marcel Pagán, Shellyne Rodríguez, Gabriella Torres-Ferrer, Edra Soto, Julius von Bismarck

Exhibition title: Contra todo autoridad…excepto mi mamá

Venue: Embajada, San Juan, Puerto Rico

Date: September 29 – November 11, 2023

Photography: all images copyright and courtesy of the artist and Embajada, San Juan

The belief in authority is the source of conscience; which is therefore not the voice of God in the heart of man, but the voice of some men in man. –Nietzsche

Embajada is pleased to present the group exhibition CONTRA TODA AUTORIDAD EXCEPTO MI MAMÁ… (against every authority except my mom…). The exhibition brings together a group of artists of varied practices that either directly confront the notion of authority or indirectly echo ideas of resistance. A tension is instigated as tender moments are contrasted by violent suggestions. Art, politics, and society collide as grandma and the state compete for sovereignty.

Marcelo Cidade (b. São Paulo 1979) graduated in Fine Arts at Fundação Armando Alvares Penteado (FAAP). In São Paulo, A selection of Cidade’s solo shows include: Kadist Art Foundation, San Francisco (2014); Galleria Continua, San Gimignano, Italy (2015, 2014); Casa França-Brasil, Rio de Janeiro (2013); Galeria Vermelho, São Paulo (2012, 2010, 2008, and 2006); Furini Arte Contemporanea, Rome (2010); and Centro Cultural São Paulo (CCSP) (2008); among many others. Cidade lives and works in São Paulo.

Lourdes Correa-Carlo (b. 1970, San Juan) is an artist who works across drawing, photography, collage, video, sculpture, and installation. She holds an MFA in Sculpture from Yale University and a BFA in Sculpture from Escuela de Artes Plásticas, San Juan, Puerto Rico. Her work has been exhibited with institutions that include the CCS Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY; ISCP, Brooklyn, NY; SVA, New York, NY; Real Art Ways, Hartford, CT; Bronx Museum of the Arts, Bronx, NY; the Core Program, Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Houston, TX; and Art Center South Florida, Miami, FL among others. She is currently exhibiting in the group exhibition, We didn’t ask permission, we just did it… curated by Embajada at Baruch College’s Mishkin Gallery in New York.

Shellyne Rodriguez (b. 1977) is a Bronx-based artist, educator, historian, writer, and community organizer who works in a variety of media, including drawing, painting, collage, and sculpture. Rodriguez earned her MFA from Hunter College in studio art and her BFA in visual and critical studies from the School of Visual Arts. Her work has been shown at The Nathan Cummings Foundation, New York, NY; Cue Art Foundation, New York, NY; Casa Warmu, Quito, Ecuador; Queens Museum, New York, NY; and El Museo del Barrio, New York, NY, among others. Rodriguez has held residencies at Hunter College, New York, NY and the Shandaken Project, Catskills, NY. Rodriguez is represented by PPOW, New York.

Chemi Rosado-Seijo (b. Alta Vega, Puerto Rico. 1973) is a socially-engaged artist whose practice juxtaposes architecture and the urban landscape, work and social action, art and its history. He graduated from the painting department of the Puerto Rico School of Visual Arts in 1997. Seijo has participated in numerous exhibitions and biennials including The Whitney Biennial (2017, 2002), Prague (2005), Pontevedra (2010) Havana (2015) and the first Thailand Biennial in Krabi (2018). In 2011 he received the Joan Mitchell Foundation grant. In May of 2015, Rosado-Seijo was granted The Robert Rauschenberg Foundation Artist as Activist Fellowship. In 2020 Rosado-Seijo had a solo exhibition at the Maria & Alberto de la Cruz Art Gallery at Georgetown University curated by Al Miner. That same year he inaugurated a long term site-specific skate bowl currently on view at Art Omi, commissioned by Zach Feuer.

Jonathan Torres (b. 1983 San Juan, Puerto Rico) received his BFA in 2009 from the Escuela de Artes Plásticas, San Juan, and his MFA from Brooklyn College in 2012 under the mentorship of Vito Acconci.

He is a recipient of the 2022-2023 Sharpe-Walentas Studio Program. His work has been collected by the Museum of Fine Art, Boston MFA, the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo (MAC), San Juan Puerto Rico, and UBS Art Collection, San Juan, Puerto Rico. Torres has been exhibiting in solo and group exhibitions between New York and Puerto Rico for over ten years including: Veta Gallery, Madrid, Spain (2023), El Kilómetro, San Juan, Puerto Rico (2022, 2021), Hidrante, San Juan, Puerto Rico (2022, 2019), Embajada, San Juan Puerto Rico (2022, 2020, 2019), Below Grand, NY (2021), Essex Flowers, New York (2020), and Museo de Arte Contemporáneo (MAC), San Juan, Puerto Rico (2020) among many others.

André Marcel Pagán Rolón (b.1984. San Juan, Puerto Rico) received his BFA from the Escuela de Artes Plásticas de Puerto Rico. He has been exhibiting between New York and Puerto Rico including Hidrante Gallery, San Juan Puerto Rico (2023), Embajada, San Juan Puerto Rico (2022), The Clemente, Lower East Side, New York (2021, 2018, 2016), KM 0.2 Gallery, San Juan, Puerto Rico (2022, 2020), Museo de Arte de Puerto Rico, San Juan, PR (2016), and many others. Marcel Pagán lives and works in NY.

Edra Soto is a Puerto-Rican born artist, curator, educator, and co-director of the outdoor project space, The Franklin. Soto has exhibited extensively at venues including El Museo del Barrio (NY), the Museum of Contemporary Art of Chicago (IL), ICA San Diego, (CA) and the Whitney Museum of American Art (NY). She has been awarded the Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters & Sculptors Grant, the Efroymson Contemporary Arts Fellowship, the Illinois Arts Council Agency Fellowship, the inaugural Foundwork Artist Prize, the Bemis Center’s Ree Kaneko Award and the US LatinX Art Forum Fellowship among others. Soto exhibited and traveled to Brazil, Puerto Rico, and Cuba as part of the MacArthur Foundation’s International Connections Fund. Soto holds an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a bachelor’s degree from Escuela de Artes Plásticas y Diseño de Puerto Rico. The artist lives and works in Chicago.

Gabriella Torres-Ferrer (b. 1987 Arecibo, Puerto Rico) is a multimedia artist and researcher whose practice considers futurability, new digital epistemologies and subverts hegemonic narratives; power dynamics and means of exchange in a globalized networked society. Torres-Ferrer’s work has been exhibited nationally and internationally including with Occupy Museum’s 2017 participation at the Whitney Museum of American Art (New York), El Museo del Barrio (New York) and online at The Wrong New Digital Art Biennale. In 2020 Torres-Ferrer received the CERN’s (Genève) guest artist prize and won the Akademie Schloss Solitude international Artist- in-Residence fellowship around the topic “Mutations” (Stuttgart). In 2021 Torres-Ferrer was featured in a 3-person exhibition at the Hessel Museum at CCS Bard curated by Isabella Achenbach. Torres-Ferrer was included in the lauded group exhibition at The Whitney Museum, no existe un mundo poshuracán: Puerto Rican Art in the Wake of Hurricane Maria curated by Marcella Guerrero.

Julius von Bismarck was born in 1983 in Breisach am Rhein (Germany), he currently lives in Berlin. He is a graduate of the Berlin University of the Arts (UDK) and the Institute for Spatial Experiments funded by Olafur Eliasson, who was his teacher until his Master’s degree in 2013. Julius von Bismarck has been the subject of numerous solo exhibitions at international museums and institutions including Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2019), Bundeskunsthalle, Bonn (2020), and Städtische Galerie Wolfsburg (2017). His work has also been shown at K11 Art Foundation, Shanghai (2019), Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt (2018), the 57th and 58th Venice Biennale (2017; 2019), MOKAK Museum of Contemporary Art, Kraków (2019), Centro per l’Arte Contemporanea Luigi Pecci, Prato (2016) and KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin (2015), amongst others. Von Bismarck is represented by the galleries Sies + Höke (Düsseldorf) and alexander levy (Berlin). He lives and works in Berlin.

Contra todo autoridad…excepto mi mamá, 2023, exhibition view, Embajada, San Juan

Marcelo Cidade, Adição por Subtração 6, 2023, Broken glass, 59 x 118 in (150 x 300 cm)

Contra todo autoridad…excepto mi mamá, 2023, exhibition view, Embajada, San Juan

Shellyne Rodríguez, Melita, La Abuela de Noelia (Carolina, Puerto Rico), 2021, Color pencil on paper, 25 x 19 in; Shellyne Rodríguez, Ruth Figueroa, Ñieta Guerrillera (Carolina, Puerto Rico), 2021, Color pencil on paper, 25 x 19 in each

Chemi Rosado-Seijo, Untitled (self-portrait), 2023, Pigment print, 69 x 49 inches

Lourdes Correa-Carlo, Enclosed View, 2008, Framed Pigment Print, 19 x 25 inches

Contra todo autoridad…excepto mi mamá, 2023, exhibition view, Embajada, San Juan

Edra Soto, Por la señal (1 of 11), 2023, sintra, mdf, latex paint, viewfinder, inkjet print, 12 x 10 x 3 in

Edra Soto, Por la señal (8 of 11), 2023, sintra, mdf, latex paint, viewfinder, inkjet print, 8 x 8 x 3 in

Contra todo autoridad…excepto mi mamá, 2023, exhibition view, Embajada, San Juan

Gabriella Torres-Ferrer, I, from the series be real, 2023, Intervened mirrored glass, electroluminescent screen, wires, 13.5 x 20.24 in (34.58 x 51.24 cm)