El canto se hizo grito (The song became a shout)

On June 22, 2021, El canto se hizo grito (The song became a shout), the much anticipated solo show by Regina José Galindo will open at the second location of Prometeo Gallery Ida Pisani (in via Ventura 6, Milan), and will include some of the Guatemalan artist’s iconic pieces alongside various new works. For now, we ask for your utmost discretion regarding the performance that will open the event; a live show that lends its name to the entire exhibition. 

Regina José Galindo was born in 1974 in Guatemala, a country where she is still very much active, and on whose political and social problems Regina has decided to focus her attention.

Using Guatemala as case-study, the artist investigates universal themes like the ethical implications of social injustice, and the racial and gender discriminations and other abuses which are inherent to the relations of power at work in society. 

“I believe in the power of Art,” the artist declares “to generate dialogues between people, I believe in its capacity to communicate, to break the pre-constituted order, and to ask questions. I believe that art is a free space, one of the few that remain. I discovered the artistic potential of the body in the 90s in Guatemala, and since then it was and has been my greatest area of inquiry.”

As performance artist and poet, Galindo works beyond the limits of herself, recreating and representing violent acts in radical ways, and giving voice to the victims of these crimes so as to instill discomfort in spectators; making them perceive what happens from the perspective of the victim in order to generate empathy and have viewers develop critical thought. 

The current exhibit, which the artist has decided to launch in Galleria Prometeo Ida Pisani’s new spaces in Milan––and with whom the artist has collaborated for over fifteen years––, highlights the tones of violence against women that exist within the somber rainbow of human tyranny, whose contours are still too opaque. 

“Gender violence” writes Rischia Paterlini in her work “is not just linked to poor and marginalized environments, we need to consider it a transverse phenomenon that knows no social, racial, religious or age difference, and has distant origins.”

The 6:30pm performance scheduled for the show’s opening night also centers on the theme of violence and feminicide.

“For one reason or another” Regina José Galindo continues, “over the course of history, various cultures have reacted collectively toward other individuals in arbitrary and accusatory ways, often out of fear. Because of this fear they were repressed, attacked, punished, even killed and presumed guilty. During the inquisition, witchhunts were a central-European phenomenon in which women were falsely accused and then persecuted; mere doubt was reason enough to convict.”

At just thirty years old, Galindo was awarded the Leone d’Oro (or Golden Lion) for “Best Young Artist” at the Venice Biennale, she has since participated on three other occasions in addition to her participation in Documenta/Kassel, the Sidney Biennial, and the Biennial of Moscow. Her work is included in the most important public collections in the world, like the MoMA of New York, the London Tate, the Pompidou Center of Paris, and the Castello di Rivoli of Turin, to name a few. At the start of 2021, she was honored with the “Robert Rauschenberg Award” and was selected by Marina Abramovic for the project We Present.