Tropical Palace

Encontros da Imagem, Portugal, 2016

For the Encontros da Imagem Festival in Portugal, I curated a projection presenting a selection of photographers working in Colombia:

Natalia Behaine
Camo – Camilo Delgado Aguilera
Karim Estefan
Cristina Figueroa
Victoria Holguin
June Juno
Maria Elena Matallana
Juan Felipe Rubio

This is the presentation text for the project:

“A few years ago I found myself staring at a billboard on the underground, a blown up photograph of a tropical beach, and by it a bungalow surrounded by palm trees and birds, selling paradise at the price of a return flight. This image resonated in my mind as I was strangely seduced by a place I knew didn’t exist. Tourism brands play on the western need for the ‘exotic’, and the idea of a tropical palace sits high in the checklist of mass aspiration.

Like the billboard, this tropical palace is also an imaginary place. It is a palace with many rooms; spaces inhabited by the narratives and atmospheres created by the invited artists. Our ‘Tropical Palace’ plays with the disparity between an idealised tropical destination and a photographed reality, certainly more uncanny and magical than any of its illusory representations.

This exhibition presents artists working in Colombia who use photography to question individual and national identities, also finding connections with geography and history.

This an invitation to come and stay at our palace”

Tropical Palace – Casa Esperança, September-October 2016