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Mi Casa es su Casa: Colectivo Martes explore motif of "home" in exhibition at CECUT

Come explore "Hogar" at Centro Cultural de Tijuana

Children swing from the top of electric poles while two dogs wander below. A solitary female figure sits inside the bedroom of a beautiful, empty house. In the distance, rows and rows of tiny houses create a grid pattern against the landscape.

These are just a few of the sights and scenes from the ambitious new exhibition by the Tijuana group Colectivo Martes (Tuesday Collective) on display now until the end of the September at CECUT, the Centro Cultural de Tijuana.

Detail from "Made in my casita" by China Lamadien
Detail from "Made in my casita" by China Lamadien

[p]Titled "Hogar" (Home), the show features eleven big installation pieces that examine the multiple meanings and the sometimes conflicting emotions woven into the spaces of house and home. The pieces fill the entryway of the main gallery of CECUT, inviting the viewers to walk around, through and under them. To see this show is a sensory delight, allowing the visitor to engage fully with the art, evoking memories of our own mother's living rooms, and prompting conversations about family, home and city.

The collective, represented in this show by eleven women artists, was formed in Tijuana in 1997 to create a space for women to support each other and develop the concepts and ideas from the unique tradition of women artists.

As Abril Castro writes in the introduction to the show, the group draws upon the inspiration of Judy Chicago, best known for her 1979 installation piece "The Dinner Party," which celebrated the lives and unique history of women by creating a collaborative installation that situated women's art and life stories in the most traditionally feminine of all spaces, the dinner table.

Installation piece by Lula Lewis
Installation piece by Lula Lewis

The artists in "Hogar" draw upon this tradition with both figurative and more abstract representations.

The show brings us these traditional women's spaces--the neighborhood, the house, the living room, the family gathered around the fireplace--and links them with the historical and geographical contexts of the rapidly growing urban space of Tijuana.

The centerpiece installation soars 25 feet overhead, an enormous arch depicting children climbing and playing on electric poles, recalls the often precarious conditions of rapidly developing colonias in Tijuana.

Another piece, titled "Refugios Peregrinos" (Migratory Refuges) brings to mind the photographs of the new suburban landscapes of Tijuana by Alejandro Cartagena, where endless rows and rows of identical cookie cutter houses extend out to the horizon.

"Refugios Peregrinos" by Lídice Figueroa Lewis
"Refugios Peregrinos" by Lídice Figueroa Lewis

Artist Lídice Figueroa Lewis complicates Cartagena's more static vision of alienation by making the houses out of transparent vinyl and allowing the viewer to see the beauty, the dangers and hidden secrets of the "home" that exists inside the mind-numbing anonymity of the houses and neighborhood.

This double vision, of both the pleasures and perils of women's place in the home, is what makes this show worth taking your time to explore. As great art should, the show will delight you and provoke thoughtful conversation in equal measure.

Artists participating in "Hogar" include: Melisa Arreola, Mónica Arreola, Silvia Galindo, Lourdes Lewis, Lídice Figueroa, Foi Jiménez, Rosa Osuna, Lula Lewis, Hilda Vanessa Ramos, China Lamadein, y Fernanda Uski, with curation by Abril Castro.

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The show is free of charge, and CECUT offers free admission to all exhibits every Sunday. The museum is closed on Mondays.

CECUT is located at 9350 Paseo de los Heroes in Zona Rio, at the glorieta Independencia, and directly across the street from Plaza Rio. For map and directions click here.

jill.holslin@sandiegored.com

For more photos of this event, click on our gallery of Hogar

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