Beatriz González

Beatriz González is an emblematic and fundamental artist from the Latin American art scene. From the beginning of her artistic career in the early 1960‘s, when she was referred as a pop artist, her works explore the sociopolitical turmoils of the violence-stricken history in postmodern Colombia. In the role of an active witness to history, the artist collects photographic images of tragic events from the contemporary Colombian press and uses them as templates for her paintings, objects and prints. Political and religious leaders, popular culture icons, but also victims of passion crimes are the protagonists of her compositions. Beatriz González is primarily concerned with memory not as a pretext for nostalgia, but, on the other end of the scale, something tightly bound to the present. Her choice of color - burgundy, blue, green, orange and purple - and technique is very related to her country. Beatriz González ironically describes herself as a "regional artist" and accompanies Colombia's strong social and political changes.

Her work has been subject to a major retrospective at Museo de Arte Moderno, Medellín (CO) in 2011-2012 and to several touring exhibitions in 2017-2018 at CAPC, Bordeaux (FR), at Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid (ES), and at KW Institute for Contemporary Art, Berlin (DE), then in 2019-2020 at Pérez Art Museum, Miami (US) and at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (US). Beatriz Gonzalez' works are represented in the collections of the world's leading museums, such as the Museum of Modern Art, New York (US), the Tate Modern, London (UK), Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid (ES), Museo de Arte Moderno, Medellín (CO) or Museo Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá (CO).