Carlos Llerena Aguirre

Carlos Llerena Aguirre represented Peru and USA with his woodcuts in the Norsk Internasjonal Grafikk Biennale, Norway. The Jubilam X Internationale Grafik Triennale, Norway and The Xylon Graphische International Triennale, Switzerland. The South Pacific 5th Bienal of Printmaking, Lima, Peru and the International Bienal of Douro, Portugal. Biennal Arequipa, Peru, Boston Printmaking Biennal. USA

An anthology of 250 woodcuts were published in Xilografias de Carlos Llerena Aguirre. Fibra y Acero ICPNA. www.woodandsteel.us Recipient of the Frans Masareel Centrum printmaking artist in residence in Belgium, the Florida’s Cultural Consortium Fellowship, the artist residence award at the Venice Large format Printmaking. And the artist residence in TAKT, Fredrichshain, East Berlin.

His video art and documentary films have been screened and officially selected in many international venues. Saynatakuna, was published in a book/DVD, Museo Contemporáneo de Lima, 2015. https://saynatakuna.wordpress.com His latest feature ethnographic documentary Qeswachaqa Last bridge of the Inca Trail. https://vimeo.com/269698923

Carlos Llerena Aguirre has published woodcuts in international journals, books, magazines, children’s books, and international newspapers. He holds an M.F.A., in Cinematography from the University of Miami. An M.F.A., in painting, a M.Ed. in Art Education from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, an M.A., in printmaking from Hunter College C.U.N.Y. New York. He is currently a tenured full professor at the University of Miami.

PRACTICE STATEMENT:

My current title is: “Defragmentation of Pre-Columbian and Post-Colonial Iconography.” My praxis involves researching icons used in art during pre-Columbian cultures in Peru. I also study the icons, archetypes and music that appeared during the Spanish colony and the republic. Currently all those icons reappear in media or popular culture with another meaning from the original ritual. I appropriate them to use in my works.

Current art and/or research interest:

I make conceptual woodcut prints, video art, graphic novels, ethnographic documentaries, and oil paintings. In my practice I appropriate icons, elements, music, archetypes, and stories from the past. I resurrect these icons or stories by changing their meaning within a different context and medium.

For my research and practice I chose intersectionality, an analytical framework to identify multiple factors of my social and political identities. I used two different paths, the personal visual practice and publishing. Besides creating woodcuts for exhibitions and Printmaking Biennales, I illustrate chronicles for major newspapers, magazines, and books. These published woodcuts, paintings and drawings have a very strong social and political impact in the world. Millions of people see it published in one day.

The same method with film. I studied and practice ethnographic documentary film; And in my other practice, I create videoart which is about visual poetry and postmodernism.