Tierra

2013 - Film & Video (Film & Video)

33:28 minutes

Regina José Galindo

location: Guatemala City, Guatemala
year born: 1974
gender: female
nationality: Guatemalan
home town: Guatemala City, Guatemala

In 2012, former Guatemalan President José Efran Ros Montt was charged with genocide and crimes against humanity; Regina José Galindo’s video Tierra is a chilling reimagining of the atrocities recounted during his trial. Tierra depicts the artist standing naked in a lush field that a bulldozer has broken up. The video references an incident in which innocent Guatemalans were brutally murdered and buried in a mass grave. The stark contrast between the machine’s force and the artist’s vulnerable body encapsulates Montt’s regime’s injustice. Moreover, the chasm surrounding her serves as a poignant symbol of the despair and alienation that political violence and tyranny frequently cause.


Regina José Galindo is a visual and performance artist. Her work investigates the universal ethical implications of social injustices such as racial, gender, and other abuses in our society’s inequitable institutions of power. In the context of a newly democratized culture, Galindo has developed a socially and politically motivated practice. She strives to acknowledge her country’s thirty-six years of civil war while also looking forward to a more peaceful and productive future. Galindo’s work focuses on historical issues that persist in the “new” Guatemala. Her work is confrontational and often shocking, bringing to light issues that few Guatemalans are willing to confront. Galindo’s unapologetically graphic actions amplify her contentious statements. She hopes to shake her Guatemalan audience out of their trance, breaking the numbness caused by years of violence. Galindo is best known for her performance work addressing the social, political and cultural violence that has affected her native Guatemala. Her work stages her own body, often submitting it to severe acts in order to evince the mass violence, crimes and sacrifice experienced by indigenous Mayan communities and the women among them who suffered the brunt of the conflict during the thirty-six year conflict. Indifference is not an option for Galindo, by appropriating destruction and loss, her work condemns the abuse of women, and propels viewers to response or resistance.


Colors:



Related works featuring themes of: » Body Art, » Central America, » Feminism, » Contemporary Participation, » Guatemalan  
» see more

Radical Hospitality
© » KADIST

Andrea Bowers

2015

Bowers’ Radical Hospitality (2015) is a sculptural contradiction: its red and blue neon letters proclaim the words of the title, signaling openness and generosity, while the barbed wires that encircle the words give another message entirely...

Study from May Day March, Los Angeles 2010 (Immigration Reform Now) and We Are Immigrants Not Terrorists
© » KADIST

Andrea Bowers

2010

The small drawings that comprise Study from May Day March, Los Angeles 2010 (Immigration Reform Now) and We Are Immigrants Not Terrorists are based on photographs taken at a political rally in downtown Los Angeles in which thousands of individuals demonstrated for immigrants’ rights...

No Title
© » KADIST

Félix González-Torres

1992

Behind the simplicity and beauty of this untitled photograph of a brilliantly-colored flowerbed by Félix González-Torres are two remarkable stories of love, loss, and resilience...

The Book Cover series
© » KADIST

Heman Chong

2009

With a habit of reading eight to ten books at the same time, Chong paints his two-foot tall novel covers through referencing an extensive reading list (accessible on Facebook) he has kept since 2006...

Other related works, blended automatically  
» see more

La Sombra (The Shadow)
© » KADIST

Regina José Galindo

La Sombra (The Shadow) is a video of Regina Jose Galindo performing with a moving Leopard tank...

Radical Hospitality
© » KADIST

Andrea Bowers

2015

Bowers’ Radical Hospitality (2015) is a sculptural contradiction: its red and blue neon letters proclaim the words of the title, signaling openness and generosity, while the barbed wires that encircle the words give another message entirely...

Study from May Day March, Los Angeles 2010 (Immigration Reform Now) and We Are Immigrants Not Terrorists
© » KADIST

Andrea Bowers

2010

The small drawings that comprise Study from May Day March, Los Angeles 2010 (Immigration Reform Now) and We Are Immigrants Not Terrorists are based on photographs taken at a political rally in downtown Los Angeles in which thousands of individuals demonstrated for immigrants’ rights...

Mother Pig, Shushi Gallery, San Diego Performance
© » KADIST

Paul McCarthy

1983

McCarthy’s Mother Pig performance at Shushi Gallery in 1983 was the first time he used a set, a practice which came to characterize his later works...

Related works sharing similar palette  
» see more

Phillips Drops a Last-Minute $35m Bacon Bomb on the November Sales
© » ARTMARKETMONITOR

Phillips Drops a Last-Minute $35m Bacon Bomb on the November Sales Francis Bacon, Pope with Owls, 1958 )$35-45m) Phillips announces tonight that it will offer Francis Bacon’s ‘Pope with Owls’ ($35 – 45 million) from 1958 during its New York Evening Sale of 20th Century & Contemporary Art...

Telmo Miel Brings Collaborative Paintings to Thinkspace
© » HIGH FRUCTOSE

Telmo Miel, the artist duo consisting of Telmo Pieper and Miel Krutzmann, brings their surreal, distinct collaborative work to Thinkspace Projects with a new show...

Gilded Lilies
© » LENS CULTURE

Gilded Lilies - Photographs by Tine Poppe | Interview by Sophie Wright | LensCulture Feature Gilded Lilies Norwegian photographer Tine Poppe’s portraits of cut flowers, shot against landscapes ravaged by climate change, propose a new take on the still life—one fit for the uncertain times we are living in...

Floral art by Andy Warhol, Pablo Picasso, Claude Monet and other artists on display at private Deji Art Museum in Nanjing, China
© » SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST

Floral art by Andy Warhol, Pablo Picasso, Claude Monet and other artists on display at private Deji Art Museum in Nanjing, China | South China Morning Post Advertisement Advertisement Art + FOLLOW Get more with my NEWS A personalised news feed of stories that matter to you Learn more The exhibition ‘Nothing Still About Still Lifes: Three Centuries of Floral Compositions’ at Nanjing;s Deji Art Museum features more than 100 modern and contemporary artworks, including (above) “Les Amoureux au Bouquet de Fleurs” (1935-1937), by Marc Chagall...

Related works from the » 2010's created around » Guatemala City, Guatemala  
» see more

Tapitapultas
© » KADIST

Donna Conlon and Jonathan Harker

2012

In Tapitapultas (2012), Donna Conlon and Jonathan Harker comment on mass consumerism and pollution by way of a game they invented...

Los Mutantes
© » KADIST

Pedro Reyes

2012

Pedro Reyes’s Los Mutantes ( Mutants , 2012) is composed of 170 plates that combine characters from ancient and modern mythologies...

Other works by: » Regina José Galindo  
» see more

La Sombra (The Shadow)
© » KADIST

Regina José Galindo

La Sombra (The Shadow) is a video of Regina Jose Galindo performing with a moving Leopard tank...

Related artist(s) to: Regina José Galindo » Teresa Margolles, » Latin America, » Ana Mendieta, » Alfredo Jaar, » Francis Alÿs, » Javier Téllez, » Tania Bruguera, » Luis Camnitzer, » Mauricio Alejo, » Michael Stevenson  
» see more

40 Km
© » KADIST

Teresa Margolles

2014

Stretching between San Pedro and the beach in Altata, Sinaloa, there is a 40 km road where there are three invisible borders controlled by rivalling armed groups...

Untitled (series)
© » KADIST

Francis Alÿs

2006

This series of small drawings is executed with varying materials—pen, ink, colored pencil, charcoal, and masking tape—on architect’s tracing paper...

The Nightwatch
© » KADIST

Francis Alÿs

2004

The Nightwatch , which is an ironic reference to the celebrated painting by Rembrandt, follows the course of a fox wandering among the celebrated collections of the National Portrait Gallery in London...

Related works found in the same semantic group  
» see more

Everything You Need to Know About Three of Asia's Most Vibrant (and Underrated) Art Capitals - via artnet news
© » LARRY'S LIST

Get a thorough breakdown of the top collectors and institutions in three vibrant art scenes: Taiwan, Singapore, and South Korea....

Gypsy
© » KADIST

Pascal Shirley

2006

Gypsy shows an ambivalent scene, in which broken blinds and its unsmiling subject are balanced with the stilllife plentitude of watermelon slices and the beautifully lit nudity of the sitter...