Víctor Pavéz – Storia

Víctor Pavéz. Chinos. 2007. Acrylic and serigraphy on paperboard. 32.2” x 32.9”. © Víctor Pavéz. Photo Vinka Quintana.

Quiroz 108 Gallery - Wynwood Art District, Miami

November 8 - December 8, 2008

By Raisa Clavijo

Storia, the recent exhibition in Miami of the works of Chilean artist, Víctor Pavéz, assembled a collection of pieces previously exhibited in Rome during the summer of 2007 at the Istituto Italo Latino Americano.

The works presented in Storia were created between 1998 and 2002. They establish a reinterpretation of the history of Chile from the personal perspective of the common man - in this case, the artist himself. It all began with a gesture by his father who, at the time of Víctor Pavéz’s birth (February 26, 1969), purchased all of the newspapers and magazines published in Chile on that date. This gesture was repeated every 26th of February, from 1969 until 1976, when the artist turned seven and the family left the city to relocate to the northern part of the country. As an adult, Pavéz discovered the storehouse of documents bearing witness to his father’s desire to have his son understand the time into which he was born and to have him find his own place within the social and political context in which he lived.

The documents, which mark Víctor Pavéz’s entrance into this world, became the basis for his recent works. The artist carefully selected clippings from these newspapers and magazines to reproduce in his works, many of them in large format, and to establish a contrast between public and private history. It chronicles a period in Chile’s history from the point of view of a person who began life at a time when the Unidad Popular government presided over the country. Using a critical eye and a very personal standpoint, Pavéz has chosen those events and personages through which he believes that period in Chilean history can best be told. His works relive scenarios from the Cold War, the Vietnam War, the figures of Nixon, Mao Tse Tung, Pinochet, Salvador Allende, General Bachelet, Gladys Marín the Communist activist, as well as many other events and personages that the artist presents to us like the pieces of a huge jigsaw puzzle for us to reassemble.

With Storia, Pavéz legitimizes the importance of the personal, intimate narrative vs. the official narrative, causing us to reflect on the traditional manipulation of historical discourse by massive communications media.

Raisa Clavijo: Curator and art critic. BA in Art History (University of Havana, Cuba), MA in Museology (Iberoamerican University, Mexico). Editor of Wynwood, The Art Magazine.