Every Monument is a Citizen is the title of the group exhibition by artists La Vaughn Belle and Jeannette Ehlers curated by Vanessa Hernández Gracia. The exhibition will open to the public on Friday, April 29, 2022, from 6:00-9:00 pm, at the art space :Pública, 1057 Avenida de la Constitución, San Juan, 00907. The exhibition Every Monument is a Citizen is part of the activities surrounding the Society for the Advancement of Scandinavian Study summit, entitled “Postcolonial Entanglements”, that took place in Puerto Rico in April 2022. The exhibition includes works from the summit’s keynote speakers, visual artists La Vaughn Belle and Jeannette Ehlers. It is the first time that the artists show their artistic work in the archipelago of Puerto Rico. Belle and Ehlers come from contexts and realities that seem disparate at first glance. Still, with a closer look, it is possible to identify coincidences, both between them and around the context that shapes the exhibition. Belle is a resident of St. Croix, one of the United States Virgin Islands (USVI). The islands’ complex colonial past dates back to having been a possession of Spain, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, France, and Denmark, before being acquired by the United States of America in 1916. For her part, Ehlers was born in Copenhagen, Denmark, where she still lives. However, her paternal family is originally from the island of Trinidad. In parallel, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the host island of this exhibition, is a former Spanish colony and a colonial territory of the United States of America since 1898.
La Vaughn Belle makes visible the unremembered. She is a visual artist working in a variety of disciplines that include video, performance, painting, installation, writing and public intervention projects. In her work she explores the material culture of coloniality, and her art presents counter visualities and narratives. Borrowing elements from history and archeology Belle creates narratives that challenge colonial hierarchies and invisibility.
Jeannette Ehlers is a Copenhagen-based artist of Danish and Trinidadian descent whose practice takes shape experimentally across photography, video, installation, sculpture, and performance. She graduated from The Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in 2006. Ehlers’ work often makes use of self-representation and image manipulation to bring about decolonial hauntings and disruptions. These manifestations attend to the material and affective afterlives of Denmark’s colonial impact in the Caribbean and participation in the Transatlantic Slave Trade—realities that have all too often been rendered forgettable by dominant history-writing.
:Pública is a non-profit organization that aims to amplify creative production, propose innovative solutions through art and produce cultural experiences from a supportive, accessible, and responsible approach to the community. Directed by Puerto Rican producer Naíma Rodríguez, and under the artistic vision of resident curator Natalia Viera, the project was born out of the need to strengthen and create connections through the curatorship of local and international exhibitions and projects on the island, and to provide a space for the conceptualization of creative projects through collaboration. The community is invited to visit the exhibition, Every Monument a Citizen, opening Friday, April 29 and will remain on view through Thursday, May 19, 2022, at Publica Espacio. For more information please contact publicaespacio@gmail.com or info@nataliavierasalgado.com.