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Rodrigo Valenzuela's studio during the making of General Song, courtesy the artist.
Exhibition
Rodrigo Valenzuela: General Song
6 Sep 2017 – 14 Oct 2017
Event times
Tue-Sat, 11am-6pm
Cost of entry
free
Address
- 929 NW Flanders St
- Portland
Oregon - 97209
- United States
Travel Information
- one block from the NW 10th and NW Glisan streetcar stop
Rodrigo Valenzuela's new staged photographs poetically explore the improvised barricade as a tool for civil disobedience in times of oppression.
About
General Song, Rodrigo Valenzuela's second solo exhibition at Upfor, abstracts and adapts images of the barricade. Drawing on his longtime interest in poetic resistance and research in Chile, Ukraine, Venezuela and other countries, the artist focuses on simple physical structures that people build in times of oppression as a means to explore civil disobedience. Valenzuela’s work is often rooted in the contradictory traditions of documentary and fiction, frequently involving narratives around immigration and the working class.
Rodrigo Valenzuela (b. 1982, Santiago, Chile) completed an art history degree at the University of Chile (2004), then worked in construction while making art over his first decade in the United States, completing an MFA at University of Washington in 2012. His work is included in the permanent collections of the Frye Art Museum, Seattle; Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art, New Paltz; Dimensional Fund Advisors and the Microsoft Collection, among others. Valenzuela, previously based in Seattle and Houston, was recently appointed to the Department of Art faculty at UCLA.