“Heaven y Hell” Dougie Padilla
July 1 – 13, 2018
“2017 was a nasty year in the United States for anybody politically to the left of Attila
the Hun. We've gone from an intelligent, educated, articulate, cultured, and compassionate president, our first president of color, Barack Obama… to an inarticulate, uncultured, quasi-educated, uncompassionate and greedy narcissist of questionable intellect and morals in Donald Trump. To make matters worse, there is a large portion of the American voting populace that idolizes the man and wants desperately to follow him into the abyss. The United States is being devastated by this madness.
At the very same time, my personal and artistic life is pretty darn good. Three years ago, I moved my studio down the Mississippi from Minneapolis to the little Wisconsin village of Pepin and spend much of my time making art and writing or wandering the natural world with my dog Stella. I have a wonderful family, a decently healthy body, close friends, enough money, and opportunities to show my work and serve others. As an elder, I am grateful that my spiritual path is deepening, and I am grateful that I am more and more able to pilgrimage between this world and the next. As a Mexican-American, I am also grateful that when Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) rolls around in the fall, I experience the joy of those on the other side visiting this world and celebrating with us here on earth.
This show speaks to these contradictions – and everything in between. It is joyous, angry, confused, sad, delighted…” - Dougie Padilla
“Borderlands” Xavier Tavera
July 15 – 27, 2018
“The history of the representation of the landscape by the Spanish in the Americas and the British in the United States has a predominant colonial position. Expeditions to the American continent frequently included artists assigned to describe the topography for military and proprietary purposes. The image of the landscape was not a contemplative one it was a statement of ownership.
In order to attempt to comprehend the current political problems regarding immigration, race, and identity I traveled to the southern border to document the aesthetics of the borderland landscape. Arid and rugged, the landscape is divided by a manmade scar that snakes through the topography in fragmented sections from west to east along the continent.
The political character of this open wound materializes in a wall with sentiments of nationalism, protectionism and absurdity. The borderlands are the representation of a region that belongs to someone else, a stretch of land that attracts and repels us at the same time. For some the borderland is the destination, for others the region is home.” - Xavier Tavera
ProjekTraum presents two solo exhibitions by members of Grupo Soap del Corazon in Friedrichshafen Germany