Juan Duque
Key words: Immediacy, specificity, de-territorialization, improvisation, precariousness, contingency, emergency. In my artist practice, being myself confronted with the contingencies that every new location, place or culture conveys, I am questioning how does immediacy contribute to expand the temporal, spatial, and subjective considerations that constitute site-specific installation art. I define immediacy in my work as an instant involvement with something, as a response against the precarious nature of the ephemeral occupation of any space. I wonder how immediacy can contribute to reflect upon the social and political dimensions of everyday spaces. Lately I have been implementing performative processes in my site-specific practice. Working mostly with organic materials such as textiles, clay, food.... transforming these materials with bodily in-situ actions such as rolling, pressing, molding, placing, folding, positioning, splitting and stressing this happens in the very space of display, sometimes against the actual surface of the space. With this actions I want to make evident the immediate reaction of the physicality of my body, challenging the process of creation, re-appropriation and time passing by, but also the precarious nature of temporary occupations. My artistic work process and methodologies are inscribed in the so-called post-studio practice. In the same way my interdisciplinary background (architecture, urban design and arts) contributes to enrich the multiple views and approaches of a research in and through art. Pieter Vermeulen, Independent curator. Juan Duque’s artistic practice is informed by contemporary notions of cultural displacement, migration and shifting identities, both on a practical and theoretical level. As such, his works are always conceived and produced in a ‘mobile studio’, an Atelier im Kopf (“studio in the head”) as Daniel Buren once expressed it, that is to say, in interaction with a specific context using found materials, textiles and other visual imagery. Duque’s work can be characterized by the term ‘sculptural precarity’, intervening, i.e. “coming in between” existing spatiotemporal parameters. In this sense, his research-oriented practice is as much site-specific as it is time-specific, centered around ephemeral, temporary occupations. Operating within the highly globalised, post-Fordist industry of the contemporary art world, Juan Duque intends to interweave this global flow with the local peculiarities of the place he finds himself in, thus renegotiating prevailing notions of cultural identity, authenticity, nationality and familiarity. Short Bio Juan Duque is an architect graduated from Universidad Nacional de Colombia – Medellin CO (1998), urban designer KULeuven BE (2005), and Postgraduate in TRANSMEDIA from Sint-Lukas, Brussels BE (2008). His site-specific practice has enabled him to realize projects in countries around Europe, Asia and South America a.o. United Kingdom, Austria, Germany, Spain, The Netherlands, Mexico, Turkey and South-Korea. He has participated in the in the collective exhibitions (selection) “No Soul For Sale” at Tate Modern UK (2010) and “Nomadic Settlers – Settled Nomads” at Kunstraum Kreuzberg / Bethanien Berlin DE (2011). He made the solo exhibitions “MEDIATION” at PLATFORM3 – Munich DE (2011) and “Con Los Ojos Cerrados” at Programa ALBO, MAMM, Medellin CO (2012). Juan Duque is part of BAM (Flemish institute for visual, audiovisual and media art) You can contact him on +32 484 955 789 or juan@betweencorners.eu