Abraham Cruzvillegas at the Mercado de la Bola in City, 2015. Abigail Enzaldo Cruzvillegas Abraham with border odyssey south-of-the- A Self-Built Man By MICHAEL SLENSK MICHAEL blouinartinfo.com september 2016 e M odern Painters odern

61 “I’m sorry, ” Abraham Cruzvillegas Last Supper, a duvet printed with the image of a shouts—half-apologetic, but slightly smirking, over tiger—that he asks local curators to source for him. the bleating horns of a mariachi band as we At first glance the work might call to mind the descend into the Cumbia-fueled chaos of Mercado practices of Sarah Sze, Jessica Stockholder, or even de La Bola. As it happens, this geodesic-domed Jason Rhoades. However, Cruzvillegas infuses bazaar on the southern edge of was his work with personal narratives and organic cofounded by his mother, Angeles Fuentes, 43 years improvisations that push political and formalist ago to the day. However, Cruzvillegas—whose first concerns to the razor’s edge of instability, and in name is pronounced “ah-bram”—had no idea that so doing have made him one of the world’s most was the case when we set out on this impromptu in-demand artists, with representation by Mexico visit to his childhood stomping grounds in Ajusco. City’s Kurimanzutto, London’s Thomas Dane The former lava-dome-turned-favela-turned-thriving- Gallery, Paris’s Galerie Chantal Crousel, and L.A.’s barrio on the southern edge of the city was built Regen Projects, which opens “Autoconcanción,” its by migrants who used the native volcanic rocks second solo show with the artist, on September 17. (and anything else they could find) to carve out a neighborhood—filled with “aesthetic promiscuity,” utside of the gallery system, in his words—that sits atop the highest point in the Cruzvillegas also produces scene- Distrito Federal. Like Ajusco, La Bola is a dizzying stealing installations at biennials labyrinth, packed tight with carniceros pushing and museums. He exhibited a wooden blanket-sized flanks of chicharon and mini hierberias block stuck with dozens of machetes offering bundles of magic candles and cans of Oand a flash kit umbrella festooned with peacock coconut-scented “money spray.” and pheasant feathers in a –curated “These are remedies for love, business, protection pavilion at the 2003 . For Documenta for the house,” says Cruzvillegas, pointing out (13), he took to the streets of Kassel with a set of products as we follow his mother around the dense Mikado sticks—painted to correspond to 34 concepts market. A Marxist-minded community organizer taken from his own writings (self-constructed; who once served as an intermediary between these handmade; written/told; a blind date)—and played same vendors and the government, Fuentes also the game in different parts of the city, erecting maintained her own stall, selling uniforms and impromptu, no-budget by following the women’s undergarments. Given her rock-star status commands of the last three sticks he picked up. with this group, his mother can’t turn a corner on Last fall he inaugurated the Hyundai Commission this festive anniversary without someone embracing at ’s Turbine Hall in London with

opposite: her or looking to snap a photo. Beyond the market, Empty Lot, a massive installation featuring 23 tons Installation view Fuentes and her late husband, artist Rogelio of soil samples sourced from 34 different local of “Abraham Cruzvillegas: The Cruzvillegas, were also leaders in the local Auto- parks, planted in 240 triangular garden boxes lit Autoconstrucción construcción (or “self-building”) movement—which by handmade lamps that encouraged all manner Suites” at the they later discussed in compelling (and competing) of vegetation. The latter project proved controversial Walker Center in Minneapolis, 2013. interviews in a titular video work by their son—that among London critics— called it a helped develop the neighborhood and subsequently “frustrating” work with “too much going on,” and below: Indio, 19 97. influenced nearly every , , and likened it to “an allotment in winter—with the Installation of 7,800 installation Cruzvillegas has made over the past slight air of a displacement camp.” But Cruzvillegas Indio beer bottles. quarter century. reveled in the chaos, and claims that he intended The artist’s upbringing has influenced his practice Empty Lot to be a more polemical, unmanicured in countless ways. “My parents used to say, ‘You piece that subverts the ideas expressed in Walter deserve nothing, you have to work.’ It was always De Maria’s intentionally lifeless The New York Earth about work, not about luck or chance,” Cruzvillegas Room. The scaffolding that supported the sprouting tells me in the car an hour later while driving a boxes, he says, was more important than the soil few miles from Ajusco to the National Autonomous contained therein. “Many times I refer to my University of Mexico (unam), where he studied work metaphorically as scaffolding—a thing you art and pedagogy. From his father, he absorbed the can easily dismantle and reuse, that takes maker’s bug and a political stance, of a sort: “I different shapes in different spaces according to

remember my father telling me, ‘We’re not rich, not specific needs,” he ventures. Cityo c xi

proletariat. We have no class. We don’t belong The Tate commission was certainly not the first e to that program. We’re not part of those ideas.’ ” time that Cruzvillegas incorporated organic Cruzvillegas recalls. material into his work, nor would it be the last. At This outsider status—honed in a world that his “Autocontusión” show at Toronto’s Scrap Metal

created itself from nothing, where one man’s junk is Gallery this past summer, Cruzvillegas suspended M ma nzutto, literally another man’s treasure—allowed a series of miniature sculptures from the ceiling— Cruzvillegas to develop an inimitable aesthetic. skate park elements festooned with meats, a taxi- nd Kuri a nd s

His work riffs on Alexander Calder, Robert Smithson, dermied duck from a local thrift shop, and a pair of a g French Fluxus icon Robert Filliou, and Buckminster work boots. For his Regen Projects show this month, e Fuller, among others, but does so with unusual he worked with an L.A.–based botanist to curate a materials such as sheep dung, ground corn, beer selection of Angeleno plants that will sit atop iron bottles, feathers, and bowling balls. His bricolaged structures welded to a very personal series of Cruzvill

installations are constructed on-site, oftentimes readymades: the back seats from the same models a h am r

with things—discarded furniture, of the of cars—including an old Opel Rekord P1, a 1969 A b

62 modern painters september 2016 Blouinartinfo.com , Minneapolis folding them over handrails, or recreating aversion or recreating over handrails, them folding assemblages, Dada junk under them stacking paintings— historical and still-life, landscape, own father’s his by works deconstructing conceptual roots. indigenous his with reconnect to semi-successfully trying dystrophy while muscular battling a wheelchair to bound he was life, of his century last quarter For the instruments. play musical how to 12 Greek, painting, woodcarving, gold-leafing,and Latin, City), México learning Zapopan, Tijuana, Monterrey, Francisco, San Zacatecas, (Guadalupe, cloisters the in amonk became later and school boarding aFranciscan in who educated was Indian father, late of aPurépecha his archive the to concerns neighborhood’s social his to activism political mother’s his from for years, memories familial mining been has artist The subject. than medium as more history personal utilizes practice but his matter,” “prime calls what Cruzvillegas from drawn when aboy. he was owned parents his R a1980s and wagon, Ford Galaxie As a student, Cruzvillegas made his earliest earliest his made Cruzvillegas astudent, As touch, autobiographical acharacteristically That’s enault 5—that enault 5—that

shoeshiner, journalist, artist, politician, and taquero and politician, artist, journalist, shoeshiner, another, one job to including from who bounced cuesta? plea ​ insisting the and Jorge Cuesta Vela Arqueles and poets Mexican 20th-century early the after Cuesta—named Arqueles character and O Damián fellow sculptor and oldest friend his with collaborations strips—including comic His cartoonist. humble. were quite efforts artistic first his even though history, of art language the within function and of form limits outer the investigate to began Cruzvillegas psychoanalytical,” “too father’s work of his became appropriation theWhen the wheel’sinto rim. fitted studies of Bicycle Duchamp’s analogue to Barnes &Noble) Barnes to when were they analogue (the Mexican Gandhi Librería in concert Jerez O head,” recalls his shaves System, the who represents barber, the and ahaircut gets Cuesta Arqueles rtega—ran in local publications like La Jornada like publications local in rtega—ran rtega, who met Cruzvillegas at a Botellita de at aBotellita who met Cruzvillegas rtega, Cruzvillegas actually cut his teeth as a where where Jornada for La one cartoon did “He El UniversalEl —was a serially unemployed punk-poet aserially —was . Cruzvillegas’s semiautobiographical semiautobiographical Cruzvillegas’s . with one of R with ogelio’s floral qué les les qué

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63 Cruzvillegas’s “Blind 64 Tierra de gigantes de Tierra S personal materials S painted for one of of one for painted elf- tudio ephemera; modern p modern 1989. O P B ortrait” works.ortrait” 15¾ x23¾ in. e lo ready to be tobe ready on canvas, w il and soil soil and il , f ro ainters ainters m l ef t: ,

september 2016 Blouinartinfo.com

Clockwise From top: Abraham Cruzvillegas and Kurimanzutto; Two images, Michael Slenske michael slenske long before it had a brick-and-mortar location. it abrick-and-mortar long before had stable Kurimanzutto’s gallery powerhouse City of Mexico heart the formed also sessions social sprawling Those Paris. of 1920s Modernists the and since earned comparisons to England’s to comparisons earned since has which arrangement, of the says Cruzvillegas education,” art real our was “That a few cervezas. and books, criticism, ideas, exchange works, share Workshops)—to (orTaller Friday Viernes los de the as years—known four next for week the every met that salons of informal held aseries They pioneer Dr. Lakra. tattoo and artist Mexican and Kuri Gabriel sculptor conceptual included also that O scene, art international growing the Pop, and O Party.) When Communist the in were friends O and ( Spain. home from who returned just had O home of Gabriel Tlalpan the to Cruzvillegas and one for the president and the rest were burned.” rest the one president for and the and La Jornada this.’ after ‘ said, newspaper and the called government The Gortari. de Salinas Carlos president, Mexican of the acaricature included “It school. high in still both from the streets, markets, and dumpsters, upon dumpsters, and markets, streets, the from collected boxes and crates food to paint blackboard by were applying made These it period.” ablack was day,” every erasing and he says. “Properly, writing was paintings—“I his blackboard to That led find. he demonstration could political every to going city the in epiphany, years four next spent the and school samba his after directly Calder Atelier way.” this why things and doing I’m I am, who again question to wanted he says. “I cancel,” to wanted “I school. of colors the the pink, and green fridge— his to tools his everything—from painting He began unsettled. studio City Mexico his to returned and of art” language the “overusing was O R to by avisit tears to moved being After 2004: in artist weight upon the fell emotional an successful, performance.pouring milk- Smith’s 1980s mid Harry to anod in juice jugo en jugo del debut, Milagro: transformación video his and transformation; car’s the commemorating cake R his paint to color theory Itten’s Johannes he used 1999 In for instance. corn, stone-ground in rendered corners Smithson ’90s— late the throughout hacks conceptual into father’s birthplace) (his Michoacan from crafts indigenous peoples.” He translated of indigenous poverty extreme “the and segregation stereotypes, Indian on beer, of areflection Indio bottles 7,800 with & Idea Art theshuttered now room at a filled 1997, In he historical. art and sociopolitical both io’s Mangueira Samba school, where Hélio school, Samba io’s Mangueira rozco served as the de facto professor for a group for agroup professor de facto the as served rozco rtega wanted to learn more about Minimalism, about more Minimalism, learn to wanted rtega iticica used to dance, Cruzvillegas realized he realized Cruzvillegas dance, to used iticica E In 1987, while studying at 1987,In studying while Cruzvillegas moved to Paris for a residency at for aresidency Paris to moved Cruzvillegas were increasingly icons to tips hat these While Y rozco knew each other because their fathers fathers their because other each knew rozco ou can’t make fun of the president anymore president of anymore the fun make ou can’t ventional materials, and references references and materials, ventional of humor, amplemade use uncon- develop of to work abody that began City, Mexico Cruzvillegas in of peers community newfound mboldened by his , 2000, finds him drinking orange orange drinking him finds , 2000, saved one copy for Abraham saved one for copy Abraham enault 5, later baking a baking later enault 5, unam , O rtega invited invited rtega

O yba rtega rtega s rozco, rozco,

out R of aDiego walking him picture you might gold earrings, gauge it weren’t If Nayarit. for the from huaraches white of pair elegant an and suspenders, wool trousers, zoot-suitish shirt, collar Nehru awhite in smartly dressed raised—he’s mother was where his from street the across children—right two and wife his with he shares Tacubaya that in villa the-century turn-of- loft-like, June at his past me this greets mohawk, but whenthick he a and scarves, colorful overcoats, favoredCruzvillegas black opening Tate the During Bad Breaking from character or a rock or punk he’s week next the rockabilly and fighter, or aninja calligrapher master azen look like can (“He chameleon. anonymous an afforded possibilities the instead preferring style, personal iconic an of concept any to subscribe to is loath also output, he definable readily anysingular, by defined be to want he doesn’t as just And players. its blue-chip from objects digestable easily craves that attempt to sneakily peek behind the painted veils veils painted the behind peek sneakily to attempt where they’ll point the crazy, to collectors drive ephemera—can loaded personally the among paper of pieces blank about jokes painting sometimes further complicated by the fact that Cruzvillegas works— of these nature teasing The pushpins. simple using walls or museum gallery to face-first, affixed, then They’re colors. various in document of each backsides the Nuñez paints papers, these from infrastructure an creating pieces.” After these in what’s is beautiful but mistake the “It’s precise, year. this earlier space of the atour me during to explained collaborator theme,” artist’s and the size facility. production main Cruzvillegas’s as Tepeyac serves Guadalupe in studio home and whose family painter and artist skateboarder-cum-conceptual aprofessional Nuñez, student former Martin and collaborator his to over he turns which peregrinations, studio-session post- vagabond, his scripts) from pharmaceutical tickets, parking clippings, porn news and cards, (business trails paper the by accumulating series Self-Portraits” “Blind his went create on to artist The over again). all (only everything erase to texts philosophical Blanchot’s Maurice from quotations or notebooks, his from sentences lyrics, song with replacing and these erasing demonstrations, Parisian the from slogans chalk he scrawledin which and Kurimanzutto stablemate Dr. Lakra, with with Dr. stablemate Lakra, Kurimanzutto and ( forms. swastika abstracted with he designed that tiles green and pink and caps, beer-bottle and blocks wood weathered from hewn wall adividing sports O C ver the years Cruzvillegas and his longtime friend friend longtime his and Cruzvillegas years ver the Nuñez’s task is to organize these documents “by “by documents these organize to Nuñez’s is task Cruzvillegas points out the entryway’s floor, out entryway’s the which points Cruzvillegas reluctantly complicit with a market amarket complicit with reluctantly only is artist much. The him bothers this that work atdelicate fairs—not more his moving time have ahard can dealers his that admits ruzvillegas ,” notes O notes ,” ivera painting. ivera painting. rozco.) rozco.)

S Cruzvillegas collaboratorCruzvillegas N Martin kateboard decks with art by by art with decks kateboard blouinartinfo.com Wheel Deal Wheel for the better.” change can things me think ofthe kind person who makes “He’s adds. he hope,” means taverns. “For me, Martin local project curatorial sited in of aforthcoming part as workbar at aMexico City dive plans toprotege’s exhibithis who also Cruzvillegas, explains he’s matter in space,” carving conceptualist heroes. Nuñez Ader, one of the artist’s occasional portrait of Bas Jan creatures theor inflected whose decks feature sci-fi- his brand, Lúdica (or “Leisure”), helms apopular skateboard sculptures totems.) and He also assemblage rolling into recycled (Meanwhile, old his are boards Little Prince– to chimpanzees from everything feature which paintings, the surrealist sport into his skateboarder, incorporates ago. Nuñez, aformer professional morebarrio than eight decades City’s Guadalupe Tepeyac Mexicograndfather in erected level home that the latter’s Martin Nuñez in the multi- time friend former and student collaborated long- with his has Cruzvillegas Abraham For the past four years,

uñez. Metal Gallery. Toronto’sfor Scrap originally intended skate performance for unrealized an transitionsand made ramps of improvised hub)art with aseries urban determined to-be- (or another streets of Angeles Los may the soon to take and Cruzvillegas skateboard, and tool is Martin’s“The september 2016 style thrashers. M odern Painters odern

65 Cruzvillegas has developed

an extraordinary system of sensual whom he’s collaborating on a series of hand-painted Mezcal bottles, have been studying the origins and and urban awareness that casually symbolic meanings of the politically fraught symbol, including its roots in Mayan culture and Zen elevates everyday poor objects to Buddhism.) Elsewhere in the house there’s a wall of ’’ political posters dating back to 1968 (from a series sublime status, and supposedly Cruzvillegas printed for a mid-career survey at the Walker Art Center in 2013). A wall rubbing that conspicuous third world traditions made during a dinner party is perhaps the most telling work in the room. “He’s one of my gurus,” Cruzvillegas says. “For him, politically, into the realms of cosmogonic it’s necessary to find precise things that mean something—but in my case it’s different. I don’t need revelations,” says curator Guillermo that emblematic use of things that point to a specific Santamarina Lagunes, a long political, historical, or economic circumstance.” fter driving from Cruzvillegas’s house time friend, who has collaborated on to unam, he takes me on a short hike up a hill where he’s been busy various shows with the artist making a public sculpture, part of his ongoing “Reconstrucción” series. over the years. “The works explore ThisA piece joins other works labeled variously as “Autodestrucción,” “Autoconfusión,” and new levels of psychological welfare, “Autocontusión.” Ideas of building and demolition are always at play in his practice: “Sometimes I say that revolution, the reinterpretation in order to make a door you need to destroy a wall,” he said in an interview in a forthcoming book of so called historical truths, and about Empty Lot. “In order to make a house, people transform and modify their spaces, destroying and the elevation of Dada from its rearranging according to specific needs, permanently. That’s what I do with my work, with my own identity.” postmodern ghetto.” At unam, Cruzvillegas is in the midst of constructing a wall atop an existing 10-meter-high barrier of volcanic rock, an un- finished mistake of sorts initiated by the university in the 1950s, which cuts through some 300 meters of unam’s botanical garden. While in today’s Trump-mad climate a large wall might seem like controversial territory for a Mexican artist, the work is actually about material contradictions, not border politics. Cruzvillegas and his team have been unearthing vegetation-covered concrete and garbage from demolished buildings around the campus, which have been buried under huge mounds in the ecological site. Though he’s still got some 270 meters to go and estimates there is another 1,000 tons of material to work with, he’s not sure the next university president will let him finish, and that’s okay with him. Looking over the unfinished project, rising above the university’s unfinished wall, Cruzvillegas is struck by a sense of wonderment. “The Blux & Somx Orangx, 1986. moment we are living in our society is Acrylic on canvas, 42 x 42 in. all about destruction, corruption, abuse, and violence,” says Cruzvillegas.

“I’m not optimistic, but I’m hopeful. ke ns

It’s not that I want to be the good e

one—I’m not—but I don’t want to be sl l part of that. How do you start things c h ae i

without hope?” MP m

66 modern painters september 2016 Blouinartinfo.com Abraham Cruzvillegas and kurimanzutto 59 x31½59 x16½ in. Mixed media, de México, 2016. México, de N at the U “ progress from in A work opposit Untitled R acional Autónoma econstrucción” e : , 1993. , niversidad