ARTWORK DESCRIPTION
The work ”Collection Inventory” is part of my project ”Notes for an Etnography of the Art World”, whose aim is to reconstruct a visual ethnography of the art field - pivoting fundamentally from my position as an artist - through different notes that map and question its polyhedral reality, the most influential actors, the social plots and relations that run through it, as well as its various problems.
Transparent and permeable curtains, theatre curtains, painted sets, camouflage fabrics, sets with photocalls and chromas, act in my pieces as interfaces or connectors between the real world and the world of art, as liminal spaces or impostured transitional geographies between the artistic ecosystem in its wild state and the ”domesticated” environment of the museum or the gallery that implies an advance in the cycle of recognition of the artist, suggesting the identification between art and artifice and evoking the idea of the invisible cloth, that is, raising the reflection on the very notion of art and its crisis of legitimacy.
In this piece, several anonymous artists are inventoried by an artistic intermediary disguised as a panda bear to facilitate their insertion into the museum and a collection.
The fable ”The Emperor’s New Clothes”, written in 1837 by the Danish Hans Christian Andersen, probably based in turn on the XXXII tale of one of the most interesting works of medieval Castilian literature, the 14th century book ”The Count Lucanor” by the Infante D. Juan Manuel, ”What happened to Count Lucanor”, inspires the narrative that serves as the guiding thread of my pieces, together with the lucid theories on the art system of the late Juan Antonio Ramírez (1994), who compared the art world to an ”extremely fragile ecosystem”, in which the survival of some species is subordinated to that of others, and since the 1980s artistic mediators have been the agents that assume a preponderant role, relegating the artist to the category of merchandise, becoming the authentic ”ready-made”.
BIOGRAPHY
Belén Mazuecos (Granada, Spain, 1978)
PhD in Fine Arts with European Mention from the University of Granada (2008) and Degree in Fine Arts from the UGR and the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera in Milan (2001) and in Social and Cultural Anthropology from the UGR (2011), she has completed her artistic training in other foreign centres, such as the Faculty of Fine Arts of the University of Costa Rica (2002), the Bocconi University of Milan (2004) or the International Center for Art Economics- Ca’Foscari University in Venice (2005-2009). She has also organised and/or participated in workshops with renowned artists such as Joseph Kosuth, Rogelio López Cuenca, María Zárraga, Narell Jubeline, Carmela Gross, Ricardo Calero, Miguel Ángel Blanco, Eva Lootz, Alejandro Gorafe, Colectivo Basurama, Ilan Wolff, Valeriano López, Lui Peiheng and Eulalia Valldosera.
She lives and works in Granada (Spain). Currently, she is a full professor in the Painting Department at the University of Granada.
PERSONAL EXHIBITIONS
2023 ”The Invisible Cloth”, Gregorio Prieto Museum, Valdepeñas (Ciudad Real).
2019 ”The Naked King”, Krakowskie Forum Kultury, Krakow.
2017-2018 ”Genius Loci: Notes for an Ethnography of the Art World”, Pescadería Vieja, Jerez (Cádiz); Touring exhibition Rivadavia, Contemporary Art Exhibition Center, Diputación de Cádiz.
2015 ”Altarpiece”, 41 m2 Gallery, Jaén.
2014 ”Wunderkammer”, La Sala de Blas, Archidona (Málaga).
”Eyes that Don’t See”, Miradas de Mujeres International Festival, El Arsenal, Córdoba.
GROUP EXHIBITIONS (selection)
2023 ”30 Years of the Gregorio Prieto Drawing contest”, Gregorio Prieto Museum, Valdepeñas (Ciudad Real).
2022 ”Al hilo de Fortuny. Dress, Identity and Contemporary Art”, Palacio del Almirante, Granada.
”35th Emilio Ollero Painting Prize”, Diputación de Jaén.
2021 ”I Granada de Fondo Prize”, Palacio Condes de Gabia, Granada.
”Grafic. Everything is Colour”, Corrala de Santiago, Granada.
”14th and 15th ed. International Contemporary Art Competition Arte Laguna Prize”, Arsenal, Venice.
”International Contemporary Art Competition Combat Prize”, Museo Civico G. Fattori, Livorno.
”Art on Paper Prize”, Museum of the Barcelona Olympic Foundation, Barcelona.
”Granada, open garden”, Palacio del Almirante, Granada.
2020 ”XXV Gregorio Prieto Drawing Prize”, Casa de Vacas, Madrid.
2019 ”XXV Gregorio Prieto Drawing Prize”, Gregorio Prieto Museum, Valdepeñas (Ciudad Real).
”The Vanity of its Beauty: Grenada as an Image for Art ”, Museo de la Memoria de Andalucía, Granada.
”The Alhambra Interpreted. Sounds, Images and Words”, Museo de BB.AA., Patronato de la Alhambra y Generalife, Granada.
2018 ”Boxes”, Félix Gómez Gallery, Seville.
2017 ”New Nomads”, Real Alcázar of Seville.
”Southern Territory”. Museum of Cádiz.
2016 ”Station Zero”, S.XXI Art Space, Museum of Huelva.
”Time of Light: Visual Artists of Andalusia”, MUPAM, Malaga.
2015 ”Territorio Sur”, Museum of Huelva.
2014 ”Variations on José Guerrero: Poetics of Colour and Limits”, Palacio de la Madraza, Granada.
”Southern Territory ”, Museum of Almería.
”Revelations”, Container-Art Gallery, Seville.
”VI Art Hotel Fair”, Cartagena (Murcia).
”Marte. International Contemporary Art Fair”, Alicante.
”Roses from the South ”, Museum of the Memory of Andalusia, Granada.
2013 ”Andalusian Art”, Beco das Artes Gallery, Goiânia - Goiás.
”Doce-Dodici”, Cervantes Institute, Milan. Touring exhibitions: Cervantes Institutes in Lyon, Palermo and Naples.
”Nobody will talk about us when we are dead”, Isabel Hurley Gallery, Malaga.
Biennial ”The Most Elegant in the Greenhouse ”, Granada.
”L’Usine Utopic”, Tessy-Bocage (Normandy).
2012 ”Spanish Contemporary Art”, Colegio de España and Art & Planete Gallery, Paris.
”Caravan”, Castello della Rancia, Macerata.
International emerging art fair ”Art Jaén”, Jaén.
2011 ”Emocionario”, Hospital Real, Granada.
Emerging art fair ”Room art fair”, Madrid.
”Art Gira Moving. IV International Meeting of Contemporary Art”, Almería.
2010 ”IX Drawing Competition of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Nuestra Señora de las Angustias”, Gran Capitán Cultural Centre, Granada.
2009 Biennial “The Most Elegant of the Greenhouse”, Granada.
”VIII Drawing Competition of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Nuestra Señora de las Angustias”, Gran Capitán Cultural Centre, Granada.
2008 ”Young Artists”, Caja Rural Central Services Exhibition Hall, Granada.
2007 ”We are all Frida”, Colegio de Arquitectos, Córdoba.
”Contemporary Expressions from Granada”, European Parliament, Brussels.
”VI Drawing Competition of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Nuestra Señora de las Angustias”, Gran Capitán Cultural Centre, Granada.
”Pepe Espaliú’07 Visual Arts Awards”, Exhibition Hall of the Youth Hostel of Cordoba.
2006 ”VIII Young Art Contest”, Gran Capitán Cultural Centre, Granada.
2005 Bienal “The Most Elegant of the Greenhouse”, Centro Cultural Caja Granada.
2004 ”Multiple Identities. Andalusian Women’s Institute Collection”, Reales Atarazanas, Seville.
2003 ”V Edition Women’s Art”, Sala Alameda, Malaga.
2002 ”Processes”, Carmen de los Mártires, Granada.
2001 ”Ritrovarsi nello specchio”, Ken Damy Photography Museum, Brescia.
GRANTS AND AWARDS
2021 Finalist in the International Contemporary Contest “Combat Prize”. Category: Drawing. Livorno.
2020 1st Prize “Art on Paper”. Barcelona Olympic Foundation, Barcelona.
1st International Contemporary Art Competition “Arte Laguna Prize”. Painting, Venice.
2019 1st National Drawing Prize “Gregorio Prieto”, Gregorio Prieto Museum, Valdepeñas (Ciudad Real).
2016 3rd International Painting Prize ”Homage to Zabaleta”. Quesada Museum, Jaén.
2013 Award of the Social Council of the University of Granada to the Trajectory of Young Researchers, Granada.
2012 2nd Painting Prize ”El Realejo”, Granada.
2011 Accesit ”V National Painting Contest Rotary Club”, Murcia.
2009 Honourable Mention ”III Painting Contest Emasagra”, Granada.
2006 2nd International Painting Prize ”Young Visual Arts Competition. VIII ed.”, Granada.
2004 3rd International Engraving Prize ”Young Visual Arts Competition. VI ed.”, Granada.
2003 Award-acquisition ”V Edition Women’s Art”, Andalusian Women’s Institute, Seville.
Artistic residence grant ”Terra de Sanxenxo. Red”, Sanxenxo Council, Pontevedra.
Scholarship ”XII Provincial Artistic Residency”, Provincial Council of Jaén, Cazorla (Jaén).
2002 3rd National End of Degree Award, Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport.
1st International Painting Prize ”IV edition of the Young Painting Contest of Granada”, Granada City Council.
2nd Prize ”Alonso Cano Awards”, University of Granada.
1999 Artistic residence ”Etrarte”, Pavia.
COLLECTIONS
Contemporary Art Collection of the Andalusian Institute for Women, Granada City Council, Sanxenxo Council, Water Foundation of Granada, Contemporary Art Collection of the University of Granada, Zabaleta Museum, Gregorio Prieto Foundation, Barcelona Olympic Foundation, TEVASA and D!FFERENT FASHION.