
Clemencia Echeverri: Sin Cielo / Skyless
Sally Frater
Falling within Clemencia Echeverri’s ongoing exploration of the social dynamics, cultural practice, and history of Colombia, Sin Cielo / Skyless is a multi-channel video wall that depicts the aftereffects of mining on the Cauca River within the town of Marmato, Caldas in the country’s northwest. Marmato has been the site of gold extraction for close to four centuries – operations that are now overseen by a Canadian multinational conglomerate. As a result of this continuous activity, the river has been transformed into a repository for chemical effluence such as mercury and cyanide. Through the deployment of scale, repetition, and sound, Sin Cielo adroitly conveys the extent of the ecological devastation that has befallen this region. Drawing a link between consumer desire and environmental degradation, Echeverri highlights the entanglements of economics, politics, and geography.
Q & A: Clemencia Echeverri
Clemencia Echeverri’s video-based practice examines violence in her native Colombia. Her Q&A provides some insight into the artist and her work: here, she reflects on her relationship to form, the conceptual issues that shape her work, the inspiration behind Sin Cielo, and a current project that she is working on for Foundacion Espacio V in Mexico.
Image detail: Clemencia Echeverri , Sin Cielo / Skyless, 2017, video wall, 11:20 mins. Courtesy the artist and Sicardi Gallery


This exhibition is organized by the Art Gallery of Guelph with the support of the Ontario Arts Council and Canada Council for the Arts.
Gallery
About the artist
Clemencia Echeverri
Clemencia Echeverri’s work explores the political and social conditions of memory, loss, and violence in Colombia utilizing a variety of media including installation, video, sound and interactivity, often setting a stage for an immersive experience. She completed undergraduate studies in Colombia and earned an MFA at Chelsea College of Arts, London. She is currently working on a project related to violence against women. Her work has been exhibited in national and international events such as the XII Biennial of Shanghai, China; Duelos a video installation in Fragmentos, Espacio de Arte y Memoria; Bienal de Arte de Cartagena; Liverpool Biennial; CENART Mexico; Daros-Latinamerica Museum; Centre of Contemporary Art Znaki Czasu, Poland; VI Bienal de la Habana, Cuba; ISEA, Helsinki and Stockholm; Rencontres Internationales France and Berlin; La Vuelta, Rencontres Internationales de la Photographie, Arles, Frances; Medellin a Colombian history, Museum Les Abbatoirs, Toulouse, and many more. Liminal, a 20-year retrospective of her work was held at Museo de Arte Miguel Urrita in Bogotá, Colombia in 2019.

View More Exhibitions

exhibition
January 18.2024 / April 21.2024
The Unsettlements is a series of projects initiated by JD Pluecker in 2018 that delve into sites of memory, silence, and ancestry, particularly in Houston and across what is now called Texas

exhibition
Tim Pitsiulak
January 18.2024 / May 12.2024
Tim Pitsiulak’s work offers profound insight into not just life in the North, but the ever-evolving impacts of colonization, particularly the effects of climate change and environmental exploitation.

exhibition
September 21.2023 / December 30.2023
This group exhibition that explores various rituals related to the everyday and the natural environment through art by those who hold cultural ties to the Caribbean.

exhibition
September 14.2023 / December 17.2023
Seeing the Land, Feeling the Sea presents landscapes by Canadian artist Takao Tanabe from AGG’s permanent collection.

exhibition
September 14.2023 / December 17.2023
This exhibition of works by Manitoulin Island-based artist Carl Beam probes the interstices of history, politics, science, materiality, and Indigeneity.

exhibition
September 14.2023 / December 17.2023
The Third Scenario examines the act of art making through hyphenated conditions and what it means to create while being Asian and living in Canada.

exhibition
July 14.2023 / September 3.2023
This exhibition highlights Grande’s distinct visual lexicon culled from her experiences as well as cultural sources – symbolic references that coalesce in surreal, painterly compositions.

exhibition
May 25.2023 / September 10.2023
Incorporating elements of local lore as well as the evolving built landscape, Norlen’s large-scale drawings explore the effects of time and the play of memory and imagination that results.