A photographic exhibition that reflects the sensations and experiences in the face of the appearance of a virus that -as in so many other affected geographies and societies in the world- shook the lives, routines and plans of millions of people, seems to summarize the experience of the disastrous 2020.
On Monday, September 28, 2020, after 189 days of confinement, the Center for the Image and 17, Institute for Critical Studies They called on the public to participate in a contest in order to show a visual account of that experience on a route of self-knowledge, reflection, rediscovery, contemplation and individual creation.
Thus was born the exhibitionMe in 2020, 2020 in mí” that can already be seen in a hybrid way and under health protection measures, in person at the Fotomuro -an open-air space- of the Image Center, in Mexico City, and on the portal https://diecisiete .org/me-in-2020/ from 17, Institute for Critical Studies Starting this January 27.
Rural teacher on the way to school.
Photo: Juan Carlos Fonsea Mata
The call, which had the participation of 617 people, resulted in the selection of 149 photographs, which invite “to clarify the present with empathy and collective recognition,” says Conrado Tostado, the curator of the exhibition, which will be exhibited at the Center of the Image until March 27.
Self portrait. Photo EE: Samantha Luis
The exhibition is divided into four axes: The others, obliterated, composed of “self-portraits” in the midst of crowds or individuals as an antonym of the collective; Clearing, where the need for contact or affection is exhibited; Exhaust… and distribute, the paradox of the extinction or gain of something, and, finally, Paradise, the absence and desire for an individual paradise, but also recovered with the presence of sounds and fauna in our environment.
When analyzing the images, explains Tostado, writer and curator of contemporary art, “I was amazed at the coincidence, the affinity of some photographs, taken by hundreds of people who had no relation to each other, although they were in the same circumstance, like the planet whole. In some cases, the contestants even took the same photo!”
Ritual. Photo EE: Rodrigo López Tavera
The qualifying jury of the exhibition has highlighted “the uniqueness, creativity, depth and relevance of the images, the diversity of the whole and the use of multiple strategies of self-representation”.
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