Contemporary Art Centre Vilnius invites you to the presentation of a new addition to our Sculpture Yard – “Guernica Syndrome – Azor” by Spanish artist Fernando Sánchez Castillo – on Thursday, 11 January, 4 p. m. at the CAC Reading Room. The event will feature a screening of the artist’s accompanying video work and present more information on its origin and meaning.
This work by Fernando Sánchez Castillo is his characteristic intertwining of the parallels of history, politics and culture. The material used for this installation is not a random array of metals – it utilizes parts of Azor, the former yacht of Francisco Franco, a totalitarian dictator who governed Spain in 1939 – 1975, processed into irregular cubes of a similar volume by a recycling plant. Azor was used not only as a representational vessel and site for international negotiations, but also, in an attempt by later rulers of Spain, exploited for tourism, provoking controversial responses within the society.
By working with difficult historical and political themes, the artist looks for ways to not only commemorate painful and traumatic historical episodes, but also to test them in a new cultural vocabulary, to rethink the positions of specific events, figures and artefacts today.
After the presentation, “Guernica Syndrom – Azor” will be exhibited at the CAC Sculpture Yard, which is accessible to visitors every day from 12 to 8 p. m. free of charge.
The event is free of charge and will take place in English.
More information: https://goo.gl/L5QfrM
Fernando Sánchez Castillo (b. 1970, Madrid) is a Spanish-born artist who employs a multilayered critique of the discourse of monuments, thus interrupting their agencies of power and representation, and revealing how history is constructed from multiple positions of authority. Sánchez Castillo graduated from ENSBA, Paris and was a resident at Rijksakademie Amsterdam. The artist has held solo shows in Spain, Austria, Germany and Sweden and participates actively in group exhibitions, amongst them – the Riga Biennial; Manifesta 11; Instanbul, Tel Aviv and Sao Paulo biennials and exhibitions at Tate Modern and MOMA.
