"Misplaced Ruins" by Gilda Mantilla and Raimond Chaves addresses the problems of engaging cultural difference, conjuring the translational and transnational negotiations required by international mobility and social, cultural, ideological, and linguistic "belonging."

Allusions to Peru abound: pre-Columbian architecture, urban sprawl, tabloid journalism, underground economy, events in recent history, traditional music, the billboard-ridden highways, and even local weather conditions (Lima’s usually overcast skies). Yet these allusions, translated by the artists, become ambiguous citations: the culturally specific reference is betrayed by the blind spots of its translation: political agendas, vested interests, equivocation. Mantilla and Chaves suggest that what different groups of people might consider "their own"—culture, history, traditions—is always a site of struggle.

Max Hernández-Calvo
Curator