JURY 2025
Circle for the selection of works
Yecid Calderón (CO – MX)
Yecid Calderón (Bogotá 1975) Lives between Bogotá (Col) and Tuxtla Gutiérrez (Chiapas). He is a philosopher, writer and performer. He holds a PhD in Latin American Studies from the National Autonomous University of Mexico, UNAM, (2021) with honorable mention for his work and research that serves as epistemic militancy from decolonial thought, performance studies,
He studied Philosophy at the National University of Colombia, graduating in 2002, and Master in Political Philosophy at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, also with Honorable Mention in 2010.
He currently directs the digital platform Cambio: Saberes para la Transformación / Change: knowledges for transformation, where he teaches innovative courses such as Queer Analysis of Digital Power, Performance and Decolonial Thought and, Bodies, Knowledge and Resistances in Latin America.
@saberescambio (IG)
@PininaFlandes or Yecid Calderon on Facebook.
The host
EXTRA, performance art festival, Mexico City, 2013.
Counterdefense
Action of putting nails in the dress (durational) and lipsync “Free” –
Trasnocheo, Hemispheric Performance Festival, Montreal, 2014.
Floripondio, cabaret performance
Galería Santafe, Instituto Distrital de las Artes, Bogotá, “Cuerpo, pornodisidencia y arte: La Fulminante”, May 2024.
Maya Rivera – Gustavo Álvarez (MX)
Maya Rivera is a performance artist based in Mexico. Her work addresses social and personal issues, using her body and movement as a means of communication. With her presence at festivals and events throughout the country, Maya has made her mark on the Mexican art scene and continues to inspire others with her transformative art. Maya is an artist who explores the dynamics of gender, motherhood, the body and the psyche through performance, using ritual as a tool for resistance, questioning and empowerment. Rivera explores a variety of deeply personal and social issues, drawing from her training as a psychologist, also inspired by feminism. Her interest is to offer audiences a unique and transformative experience. With Gustavo Alvarez she organizes performance meetings, such as: Encuentro Internacional Performancear o Morir, (Sierra Tarahumara), Festival de Performance InSitu Chihuahua, and InSitu Guanajuato.
Gustavo Alvarez Performance Artist and Social Anthropologist (CDMX-1973) Trained as a Social Anthropologist at the National School of Anthropology and History. His artistic work focuses on topics of the social fabric such as violence, ritual and decolonial practices from the body and performance art as a practice of the archeology of the self. He started in performance art in 2005, with 20 years of experience. She has presented her work in different countries such as France, Italy, Canada, Colombia, Sweden, Taiwan, Chile, Norway, Peru. He has participated in important events in the country such as the First National Performance Exhibition. Together with Maya Rivera he organizes performance encounters, such as: Encuentro Internacional Performancear o Morir, (Sierra Tarahumara), Festival de Performance InSitu Chihuahua and InSitu Guanajuato. He is interested in the pedagogy of performance, teaching laboratories in multiple academic spaces such as the Institute of the image in France, the University of Guanajuato, ExTeresa Arte Actual, University of Coahuila, University of Yucatan, Museum of Modern Art of Mazatlan, among others.
http://www.performancearomorir.blogspot.com
http://www.facebook.com/Musgus
Performancear o Morir
Maya & Gustavo, 2022.
Círculo
Maya & Gustavo.
Collective Performance at Festival Decrépito
Maya Rivera
Action at Rencontre internationale d’art performance / RIAP
Gustavo Alvarez
Rossella Matamoros (CR)
Rossella Matamoros. BFA in Painting, UCR 1983 French Government Scholarship, École des Beaux Arts and Arts Décoratives, Paris, 1988-89. Master in Fine Arts, George Washington University, USA 1992, Fulbright Scholarship, USA. Japan Foundation Fellowship, Kyoto Seika U. 1999-2000. Worked for the Smithsonian Washington DC 1988-93.
Most important awards and distinctions
Costa Rican National Awards Aquileo J. Echeverría 1998, exhibition and performances.
“On the other, the being and the scene” ” Museo de Arte Costarricense. 2003 installation and
performances “The pleased root of my shadow” Museo de Arte Costarricense.
Venice Biennials 2003. Invited participant with installation “Mi corazón de ciudad
fortress” and Venice Biennale 2017 invited to collective performances with Jelily Aticu and Hanna Halprin.
Proartes scenic award 2010 with “The verb that fills” traveling multimedia installation and
performances, Museum of Contemporary Art and Design in Costa Rica.
– 2019 Have you heard it? have you felt it?, installation and performances, about teenage pregnancy declared of cultural interest for the country by the Ministry of Culture, Calderón Guardia Museum, Costa Rica.
Francisco Amighetti National Prize 2020 Installation and video performance “Do we see ourselves in the mirror?
Museo de Arte y Diseño Contemporáneo, Costa Rica.
2021 Artistic Residency “Próxima Temporada” on climate change, video performance “EL ABRAZO”, collaboration with the Ministry of Energy, CR and the International Institute for Sustainable Development, presented at the Museum of Contemporary Art and Design. Costa Rica.
-2021 U.S. Embassy grant for art and climate change project in rural area “Green in our hands, Costa Rica.
-2021, Selected for the Kárstica residency, performance work with the elders of Cañada del Hoyo and exhibition “Territorios mestizos, Museo la Neomudéjar. Madrid.
-2023 Madrid. Selected for the performance festival “Un aguacero” with the work “Desarrollo? vos sí creés?” (about femicides). Gallery Nadie, Nunca, Nada, No.
2024 Multimedia exhibition and performances “Absence / Creativity” September 24 to November 30.
September 24 to November 30. On youth anxiety and depression. Calderon Guardia Museum, Costa Rica.
She has exhibited in more than 150 exhibitions for over 35 years individually and collectively in Costa Rica, USA Washington DC and New York, Italy, Spain, France, Switzerland, Taiwan, Japan, Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Honduras, Panama, El Salvador, Guatemala and Peru.
Performances: Mexico, Peru, Costa Rica, Colombia, Chile, Washington DC, Spain, Japan and New York. Biennials: Venice, Italy #50 and #57 – San Juan, Puerto Rico – Tijuana, Mexico – Chapingo, Mexico – Bienarte, Costa Rica – Marte, Salvador – Idearte, Honduras.
Work: in drawing, sculpture, painting, installation, performance, video and costume dramaturgy and lighting design.
Research topics: adolescence, climate change, human rights, trauma and recovery with emphasis on abuse, gender and immigration.
IG: rossellamatamorosj
Facebook: Rossella Matamoros Jiménez
Youtube: Rossella Matamoros
Ausencia-Creatividad
Exhibition 2024. Rossella M. & CP Chaves
¿En el mismo Barco?
Rossella Matamoros, Museo Calderón Guardia, 2021.
KIRIE
Rossella Matamoros, Costa Rica 2011
Isabel León (ES)
Isabel León, Cáceres, 1974. Visual artist and performer based in Granada (Spain), independent cultural promoter and teacher. Graduated in Fine Arts at the Polytechnic University of Valencia and “Erasmus” scholarship in Athens (Greece) and “Promoe” in Havana (Cuba). Official Master in Art Production and Research at the University of Granada.
She has participated in numerous festivals, action art encounters and national and international residencies, both in art centers and museums in Spain and in Finland, Germany, Canada, Morocco, Ukraine, Lithuania, Austria or Norway, among others. She has received the Nordisk Kunstnarsenter Dale (Norway) residency, Grants for the Promotion of Contemporary Art of the Ministry of Culture and Sport (Spain), EAA Grants (Norway), Saari Residence of the KONE Foundation (Finland) among others.
She co-coordinates the EXCHANGE Live Art project with the artist Ana Matey, in which they research on communication and shared creative processes. Since its inception in 2012, they have carried out more than thirty residencies, laboratories, meetings and workshops both nationally and internationally, working with more than sixty artists from different backgrounds, generations and trajectories. She combines her artistic practice with the teaching of action art, teaching workshops in different contexts and institutions such as art centers, universities and independent spaces.
Her work moves between video performance and live action art, media to which she has been intensely dedicated since 2007. She conceives artistic practice as an act closely linked to life, so her work is connected to her most intimate feelings, thoughts and emotions. She is interested in the apparently insignificant or trivial, playfulness and the absurd, her work arises from the here and now allowing a special space for intuition.
www.isabelleon.com
www.niyamasaucha.com
www.vimeo.com/isabelleon
IG: @isabelleonperformanceart / @exchangeliveart
“Cada día” / “Everyday”
Festival Cuerpo a Cuerpo
Octubre, 2019. Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. España
“Sin leche” / “Milk free”
P.E.P.A. (Pequeño Evento de Performance Art)
Mayo, 2021. Madrid. España
“Sexto sentido!” / “Sixth sense!”
Ciclo de performances Arteva.
TAC de Valladolid. España
Mayo 2019
Sinéad O’Donnell (IE)
Sinéad O’Donnell lives and works in Belfast. Her practice is visual / performance she has made works across the globe, integrating her learning of new cultures with personal experience. Sinead uses her body to create works that reference the challenging experiences that women face across the world: she gives a voice to those that have been silenced. Previous works have addressed: violence; grief; being neuro-diverse in a neuro-typical world; inclusion; and exclusion.
Sinéad’s practice is nomadic and travel has broadened her cultural perceptions and influenced her artistic sensibilities regarding time and space. She is active on the Belfast performance art scene working with local organisations to foster performance art activity and supporting emerging artists in her community. Curating artists, exchanges, projects and exhibitions between Northern Ireland and Canada, Chile, Croatia, Germany, Guatemala, Dominican Republic, Ireland, Japan, Iraq, Montreal, Peru, Transylvania region Romania, Scotland, Serbia, Singapore, Thailand, Poland, Peru, Montreal and U.S.A.
Recent work has been presented at ‘Bounce’, disability lead arts festival, Belfast, Common Ground Work, Bbeyond, Belfast N.Ireland (2024). Golden Thread Gallery, Belfast, IKON gallery, Birmingham, Artarcedia, Derry (2023), ‘Closer Distancing’ online exchange, Asiatopia, Thailand, Culture Night, Blackbox, Belfast (2020), Abriged, Derry, (2022)‘Crossing Permissions’, Major solo show, MCAC, Portadown, N.Ireland (2019), Art Center Ongoing, artist in resident, Tokyo, Japan, Peras de Olmo – ARS CONTUNUA, Argentina (2018),‘Future Histories, Kilmainham Goal, Dublin, Ireland (2016), ’‘TIPA’ this is performance art, Peacock Visual Arts center, Aberdeen, Scotland (2015), ‘Art of the Lived Experiment’, Bluecoat, Liverpool, UK, ‘Voices Travel’, Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, Taiwan (2014), ‘Asiatopia’, Bangkok Arts & Cultural Centre, Thailand (2013), Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb, Croatia, (2013), Golden Thread Gallery, Belfast, Northern Ireland, (2012), Southbank Centre, London (2012).
Arts Council of Northern Ireland, British Council, Arts & Humanities Research Council, ArtsAdmin, ‘iDA’ Individual disabled Artist Award, University of Atypical ,Deaf & Disabled artist support fund, University of Atypical, Freelands Foundation, and Socrates Erasmus are some of the funding bodies that have commissioned her work.
Statement / Work conceptsDeclaración / Conceptos de trabajo
Her work explores identity, borders and barriers through encounters with territory and the territorial. She sets up actions or situations that demonstrate complexities, contradictions or commonality between medium and discipline, timing and spontaneity, intuition and methodology, artist and audience. She uses photography, video, text and collage to record her performances.
She often uses her body to investigate both her own and cultural boundaries, particularly in relation to the restrictions placed on women. Despite deliberately avoiding the sensationalisation of the body, her works often promote strong reactions and emotions.
‘Spirit Fear’
Cushendun, North of Ireland, 2020.
ABRIDGED 1+2
Sinead O’Donnell, BACKWARD DERRY 2021
Uprooting
Sinead O’Donnell, Tallaght
______________
Regretfully, our dear colleague and Jury member Dr. Yecid Calderón (CO-MX) was not able to participate in the selection process, due to unforeseen personal circumstances. While wishing him their best resolutions, knowing that it was his wish to conform this task, we take the opportunity to thank the 2025 Jury for their generous accomplishment through the very difficult task of selecting works from a pool of over 170 very diverse and valuable pieces received.