Regina José Galindo

La Sombra (The Shadow)

2007

La Sombra (The Shadow), 2017 (Still)

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La Sombra (The Shadow) is a video of Regina Jose Galindo performing with a moving Leopard tank. The artist runs until exhaustion across a dirt field in what looks like a military site. Recorded for the camera, and projected on loop, the video performance was created for Documenta 14. Galindo dedicated the work to all women who go unnoticed and whose screams remain unheard. The artist states that she wanted to highlight the under-recognized fact that Germany is a major arms exporter, with Guatemala a prize client. The work thus seeks to unpack the city of Kassel’s loaded yet veiled history as one of Germany’s biggest arsenals. The battle-tank that pursues the artist in the video was made for cross-country warfare and invented in Germany. The company who manufactured the turret of the tank is in fact still partially owned by the family of Arnold Bode who founded the Documenta exhibition in 1955. La Sombra points to the entanglement of the apparatuses of art and war and the international art market.

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From the artist:

We can not escape the horror
Follows us
It is our shadow.

The great powers control the arms market, produce them, sell them. Countries in crisis buy them, use them. Germany is among the top five arms manufacturers in the world. Big profits are made by the sales of Leopard tank, that is exported, inclusive, to conflict areas. It seems that we can not control the battles.

Commissioned and produced by documenta14, Kassel, Germany
Camera and edition Nicolas Rösener
Second camera Gabriel Caballeros
Curator Monika Szewczyk
Production Leon Hösl

Regina José Galindo is a visual and performance artist. Her work investigates the universal ethical implications of social injustices such as racial, gender, and other abuses in our society's inequitable institutions of power. In the context of a newly democratized culture, Galindo has developed a socially and politically motivated practice. She strives to acknowledge her country's thirty-six years of civil war while also looking forward to a more peaceful and productive future. Galindo's work focuses on historical issues that persist in the "new" Guatemala. Her work is confrontational and often shocking, bringing to light issues that few Guatemalans are willing to confront. Galindo's unapologetically graphic actions amplify her contentious statements. She hopes to shake her Guatemalan audience out of their trance, breaking the numbness caused by years of violence. Galindo is best known for her performance work addressing the social, political and cultural violence that has affected her native Guatemala. Her work stages her own body, often submitting it to severe acts in order to evince the mass violence, crimes and sacrifice experienced by indigenous Mayan communities and the women among them who suffered the brunt of the conflict during the thirty-six year conflict. Indifference is not an option for Galindo, by appropriating destruction and loss, her work condemns the abuse of women, and propels viewers to response or resistance.

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Regina José Galindo La Sombra (The Shadow)

Regina José Galindo

La Sombra (The Shadow)