LECTURE: YOSHUA OKÓN
The Art | Crime Archive Lecture Series Presents: Yoshua Okón
Thursday, April 20th
4:00 pm – 5:00 pm
San Diego State University
Physics Building Room 145
Open to the Public
The artist Yoshua Okón was born in Mexico City in 1970 where he currently lives. His work, like a series of near-sociological experiments executed for the camera, blends staged situations, documentation and improvisation and questions habitual perceptions of reality and truth, selfhood and morality. Working with marginalized subcultures such as Nazi-war memorabilia collectors, corrupt law enforcement officers, and Guatemalan day laborers, Okón creates discomfiting situations that often antagonize the viewer’s sense of taste and propriety, while subtly revealing the problematics of global social and economic relations. His artist talk will focus on work from his 20-year career.
In 2002 he received an MFA from UCLA with a Fulbright scholarship. His solo shows exhibitions include: Yoshua Okón: In the Land of Ownership, Asakusa, Tokio; Salò Island, UC Irvine, Irvine; Piovra, Kaufmann Repetto, Milan; Poulpe, Mor Charpentier, Paris; Octopus, Cornerhouse, Manchester and Hammer Museum, Los Angeles and SUBTITLE, Städtische Kunsthalle, Munich. His group exhibitions include: Manifesta 11, Zurich; Gwangju Biennale, Korea; Antes de la resaca, MUAC, Mexico City; Incongruous, Musèe Cantonal des Beux-Arts, Lausanne; The Mole´s Horizon, Palais des Beaux Arts, Brussels; Mercosur Biennial, Porto Alegre; Amateurs, CCA Wattis; San Francisco; Laughing in a Foreign Language, Hayward Gallery, London; Adaptive Behavior, New Museum, NY and Mexico City: an exhibition about the exchange rates between bodies and values, PS1, MoMA, NY, and Kunstwerke, Berlin. His work is included in the collections of Tate Modern, Hammer Museum, LACMA, Colección Jumex and MUAC, among others.