Mars: Memories to Forget
Marte: Memorias para olvidar

A bilingual exhibition presenting the work of the Mexican artist Federico Jordán, curated by UTSA graduate MA Aurora Berrueto.

Federico Jordán (Torreon, Mexico, 1969.) is a Mexican visual artist with a 25 year long career as an editorial illustrator. His illustrations have been published internationally in recognized publications such as Letras Libres, The New York Times, Forbes, The New Yorker, and Wall Street Journal. He has been recognized as one of the most influential Mexican illustrators following in the footsteps of Miguel Covarrubias (Mexico City, 1904-1957) and Abel Quezada (Monterrey, Mexico 1920-1991). During the past decade Jordán has also been working in diverse media such as sculpture, photography, painting, ceramics, and virtual reality. By exploring in new media he has focused mainly in interventions of old documents and abandoned spaces, as well as the creation of drawings in massive scale on barren lands, documenting with aerial photography.

In Mars: Memories to Forget, Federico Jordán intervenes the ruins of a ghost town in the middle of the Northeastern Mexican desert, a project that Aurora Berrueto documents and analyzes to be presented as her M.A thesis in Art History and Criticism (UTSA). Jordán paints and builds over walls, soil, and debris, and Berrueto discovers the epic narrative behind the symbols.

The photographic register of the artist is presented in this exhibition along with a series of drawings on the subject and the accompanying exhibition catalogue. The project also raises questions about the conceptions of high-art and low-art and the role of the artist, the audience, and the art market.

Jordán has exhibited his artwork internationally including in the cities of Monterrey, Mexico City, Bogota, Barcelona, San Francisco, and London. Actually he continues working as a freelance editorial illustrator and as an art professor in Universidad Autónoma de Coahuila, while his artwork is more focused on painting and conceptual art.

On view September 6 to September 22, 2018
Opening Reception: Thursday, September 6, 6-9 p.m.
Open for First Friday, September 7, 6-9 p.m.