Maru Rojas (1982, Mexico City) makes drawings, media art, installations and conceptual writings. By taking daily life as subject matter while commenting on the everyday aesthetic of life, Rojas often creates work using creative game tactics. Play is a serious matter: during the game, different rules apply than in everyday life and even everyday objects undergo transubstantiation. Her drawings are characterised
Maru Rojas (1982, Mexico City) makes drawings, media art, installations and conceptual writings. By taking daily life as subject matter while commenting on the everyday aesthetic of life, Rojas often creates work using creative game tactics. Play is a serious matter: during the game, different rules apply than in everyday life and even everyday objects undergo transubstantiation. Her drawings are characterised by the use of everyday objects in an atmosphere of middleclass mentality in which recognition plays an important role. Her works focus on the inability of language to visualise reality, the attempt of dialogue, the dissonance between form and content, text and image and the dysfunctions of language. Transformed into art, language becomes an ornament. At that moment, ambiguity and indistinctnesses, which are inherent to the phenomenon, come to the surface. Her works demonstrate how life extends beyond its own subjective limits and often tells a story about the effects of global cultural interaction. It challenges the binaries we continually reconstruct between Self and Other, between our own ‘cannibal’ and ‘civilized’ selves. Maru Rojas currently lives and works in London. * Although this statement does in a way summarise my work it was "written" using an artist statement generator that can be found here (http://500letters.org) and should not be taken literally.
EDUCATION
2010 – 2012
MFA Art Writing. Goldsmiths College, London
Recepient of Goldsmiths International Scholarship
*FONCA Scholarship for postgraduate studies abroad
*Jumex Foundation grant
2010
Contemporary Art Training – Visions of Art
Online Diploma – The Triumph of Painting – The derived advancement of the Painterly beyond other Medias.
2004-2008
BA Fine Arts. Universidad de las Américas, Puebla, México
1st degree, Magna Cum Laude
2005-2006
Exchange Programme. History of Art. University College London, UK
1998 – 2001
Alexander Bain School. IB Diploma, Mexico
WORK EXPERIENCE (FACILITATION & GALLERY EDUCATION)
Name of the programme or setting in italics, then name of the company in brackets.
From Jan 2014:
Adobe Youth Voices Mentor (Eastside Trust)
Pathways Programme, Towner Gallery in Eastbourne
Jan 2013 – Nov 2014
Orchard Primary School (Bigfoot Arts Ed.)
Barking Riverside School (Eastside Trust)
Hilldene, Romford (Eastside Trust)
Sept 2010 – May 2012
Lonesome Primary (Bigfoot Arts Ed.)
May 2012
Youth Offending Team: Lead artist (Creative Junction)
August 2011
Newport Primary School, Lead artist (Ape Media)
September 2011
Youth Offending Team: Emerging artist collaborator (Creative Junction)
January – July 2010
GCSE Art Teacher (YESS London pupil referral unit)
April – July 2010
Belvedere Infant School (Bigfoot Arts Ed.)
April – July 2009
Youth Programmes Internship (Orleans House Gallery)
2006 – 2008
Art Teacher (Montessori Cholloyan School)
Exhibitions
2014
July 2014
Diep & Newhaven Ferry (collaboration with George Major)
June 2014
Camaradas, Mexican Embassy (collaboration with George Major)
2013
July 2013
Now Wakes The Sea, Kinsale Arts Festival, Ireland
2012
December 2012
National Open, Motorcade Flash Parade, Bristol, UK
July 2012
Language Most Makes a man, speak that I may see thee…, Goldsmiths Postgraduate Show, London
2011
July 2011
Summer Salon, collective exhibition, IAF Islington Arts Factory, London
June 2011
And there it was… collective event, Chisenhale Gallery, London
May 2011
Tick the Box: Exploring the Intricacies of Categorisation, Southside Shopping Centre, Wandsworth, London
Tick the Box: Part 2, Sprout Gallery, London
2010
August 2010
Contemporary Art of the Central Mountains of Mexico, Turchin Centre, University of Boone, North Carolina, US (Collaboration with artist Paola Montoya)
May 2010
How Beautiful Ugliness Is, Red Gate Gallery, London
2009
December 2009
9th Encounter of Contemporary Art, Museum of Contemporary Art and Design, Puebla, Mexico. Selected in the bidimensional category, highly commended
2008
June 2008
Memoria Pixel, La Luz de la Nevera, UDLA, Mexico
2007
June 2007
Heráclito (544-484 a.c), Galeria Sitio 3, Puebla, México
March 2007
Topografías, La Luz de la Nevera, UDLA, Mexico
COMMISSIONS & RESIDENCIES
October 2013 - November 2013
Bundanon Trust, Australia
UNESCO/Aschberg Artist in Residence
August 2013
Aabenraa Artweek
Residency in public spaces
July 2013
A-N Interface Writing Bursary
Neo:art prize, Bolton
October 2011 – March 2012
Whitechapel Gallery, Seminar Series
Art Writing is an anthology of examples
June 2012
A-N Interface Writing Bursary
Quarantania, John Hansard Gallery
January 2012
A-N Interface Writing Bursary
In collaboration with Peckham Space
July 2011
A-N Interface Writing Bursary
Catherine Yass at De La Warr Pavillion
October 2010 – May 2011
Wandsworth Arts Team
Diversity Commission
September 2010 – June 2011
Chisenhale Gallery, And There it Was...
WRITING & PUBLICATIONS
September 2013, Axisweb, The Rant
April 2013, Young Fresh and Relevant, Issue 3
Nov 2012, COPY: Charts, with Yorkshire Sculpture Park
http://copypages.org
July 2012, Idioglossia, an Art Writing Glossary
http://b--k.co.uk/2012/idioglossia/
April 2012, A-N Magazine
March 2012, Tengen Magazine, Issue 4
http://issuu.com/tengenmag/docs/tengenissue4
March 2012, A-N Magazine
December 2011, Young Fresh and Relevant, Issue 2?
http://youngfreshrelevant.com/issue2.html
