ABOUT THE EXHIBITION

Claudia Bernal’s first solo exhibition in Toronto, held after over twenty years of artistic practice, comes at a time of extreme violence and oppression in the world, where genocide, apartheid, and ethnic cleansing have been sanctioned rather than blocked or condemned by Western governments. Within a settler colonial state that oppresses the existence of dissidence, the act of existence is to resist, and art within this context has become a tool of that same resistance. Bernal’s artistic practice involves her own body as a site of contestation, informed by her place of origin, Colombia, a state that has endured war, violence, forced displacement, and death. Warrior from the Andes alludes to the artists’ state as she settles and navigates on Indigenous land on Turtle Island while situating her own experiences and critical consciousness from the perspective of the Global South as a diasporic subject. A strong advocate against violence and forced displacement, Bernal’s work was as relevant twenty years ago as it is today.

The artist uses her subaltern diasporic body to contest coloniality within a predominantly white settler colonial state that renders her invisible. She challenges Eurocentric Western epistemologies and aesthetics and dismantles subjectivity to instead offer her own form of identification through various objects, images, and performances. Using her own in-between diasporic state as a strength and as a combative tool, she defies oppressive narratives and creates relationships of solidarity.

Bernal gains agency with the presence of her own body within the landscape of Canada that neglects her existence. She overcomes and empowers her own body as territory through actions, performances, text, and images, becoming an embodiment of strength and of endurance.

Curated by Tamara Toledo.

LOCATION

Sur Gallery Exhibition: 39 Queens Quay East, Suite 100

Gallery Hours (during exhibition):

Wednesday - Friday noon-6:00PM

Sat 11 AM-5 PM