"The Garden of Forking Paths: Contemporary Art from Latin America"
1999-09-10 until 1999-10-31
Helsinki Art Museum
Helsinki, , FI Finland

The Garden of Forking Paths presents a view of contemporary Latin American art. With works by 20 artists from eight countries, the exhibition includes photography, installations, video art and sculpture. The name of the exhibition is borrowed from a collection of short stories of the same name published in 1941 by the world-famous Argentinean writer and poet Jorge Luis Borges.

The artists are Luis Benedit, Victor Grippo, Liliana Porter, Miguel Angel Ríos and Sergio Vega from Argentina, Tania Bruguera, Ernesto Pujol and Los Carpinteros from Cuba, Marcelo Krasilcic, Vik Muniz, Rosângela Rennó and Miguel Río Branco from Brazil, Alfredo Jaar from Chile, Juan Fernando Herrán, Nadin Ospina, José Alejandro Restrepo and Carlos Uribe from Columbia, Miguel Calderón from Mexico, Milagros de la Torre from Peru and José Antonio Hernandez-Diez from Venezuela.

The exhibition approaches Latin American contemporary art through the Borgesian metaphor of a labyrinthine garden. Meanings in art come in layers, their ways forking and crossing one another like the meandering paths of a labyrinth. To enter the labyrinth of art may lead to a life-long journey of adventure and discovery.

The exhibition is curated by art critic Octavio Zaya from New York, and produced by the Danish Kunstforeningen. It has already been shown in Copenhagen and at the Edsvik Konst och Kultur centre in Sweden. In Helsinki, the exhibition is presented at the Helsinki City Art Museum’s exhibition space in Meilahti.

I thought of a labyrinth of labyrinths, of one sinuous spreading labyrinth that would encompass the past and the future and in some way involve the stars...This network of times which approached one another, forked, broke off, or were unaware of one another for centuries, embraces all possibilities of time.

Jorge Luis Borges (translated by Donald A Yates)

For additional information, please contact: Chief Curator Maija Tanninen-Mattila, tel. 09-310 87 005, Educational Curator Arja Hentinen, tel. 09-310 87007, Curator Sointu Fritze, tel. 310 87022, Exhibition Secretary Anna-Kaarina Kippola, tel. 09-310 87003, Information Officer Karri Buchert (material for the media), tel. 09-310 87004. Guided tours are conducted free of charge on Wednesdays at 5 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m. in Finnish. Tours in Swedish are arranged on the 2nd Sunday of the month at 1 p.m. Tours can also be booked for other times, tel. 09-310 87003. Admission fee is FIM 25/20, children under 18 are admitted free of charge.

Related Links:

Indepth Arts Resources for Finland

Other Important Exhibitions in Helsinki