MARCO

Jose Dávila (Guadalajara, Mexico, 1974)

Davila’s works show a strong relation with matter, structure, the architectural detail of a place and the space itself; aspects revealing his training as an architect. He creates photographs, sculptures, installations and interventions in which he interacts with the spaces we inhabit, always staging the architectural representation, creating unique spaces which make the constructions’ intrinsic qualities stand out. Thus, he creates works like the one made in Santiago de Chile in 2002, in which he formally camouflages one of the crossbeams supporting the exhibition space with a pile of used cardboard boxes, or the Container realised in Art Basel Miami Beach in 2008, where he cuts a container into pieces of the same size, to subsequently remove some of the pieces, therefore creating an installation that reminds us of the Donald Judd’s classics — the shipping container as an object that modifies and articulates space. In his proposals for Camden Arts Center (London, 2001) and Casa de América (Madrid, 2005) he duplicates the buildings’ façade by means of scaffolding structures and coloured coating plastic fabrics, through which he transforms the relationship between the passerby and the building, as he invites them to go out through the scaffolding stairs. It is about pieces which show that architecture and its representation constitute the centre of his work, his research and intervention fields.

Jose Dávila was born in Guadalajara (Mexico) in 1974. After his graduate in Architecture at Instituto Tecnológico y de Estudios Superiores de Occidente TESO in Guadalajara, Mexico (1998), he completed his training with his residence Braziers Intl. Workshop in Oxford, UK (2000); residence in Camden Arts Centre (2001) as a result of the The Andy Warhol Foundation Award; residence in Kunswerke, Berlin, Germany (2003-2004); and the latest residence at MAM São Paulo, Brazil (2009). His career has been acknowledged with various schollarships and awards: the selection for the III Bienal Iberoamericana de Arquitectura in Santiago de Chile (2002), Premio Jóvenes Creadores, FONCA, Mexico (2001), selection for the Bienal de Monterrey, member of Ediciones el Chino (2001), or the scholarship to take part in the seminar ‘Estudios de Arte Contemporáneo’, FARCO A.C., Guadalajara, Mexico (1998). Watch your step was his first solo exhibition in Galería NAP, Guadalajara, Mexico (1998), and many others to follow: Temporality is a question of survival at Camden Arts Centre, London UK (2001), Erasing Memory, Galería Enrique Guerrero, Mexico (2002), Project room at ARCO 04, Madrid (2004), Nomadic Platform, Casa de América, Madrid (2005), The Illegal Architect, Studio d’Arte contemporanea D’abbeni, Lugano, Italy (2006), Hechiso, Valenzuela & Klenner, Bogotá, Colombia (2007), Studies for Future Buildings, Renwick Gallery, New York (2008), Container, Renwick Gallery Art Positions, Art Basel, Miami Beach, Florida (2008), Flying City, COMMA’03, Bloomberg SPACE, London, UK (2009), Dos más dos igual a cinco, Travesia Cuatro, Madrid (2009). Among his group shows: Selección Bancomer, Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City (2003), Light and atmosphere, Miami Art Museum, Miami, USA (2004), To build, to dwell, to think, IVAM, Valencia (2008), PRETHUNDERDOME curated by Matthew Strauss, White Flag Projects, St Louis, USA (2009), Colección Jumex, Bass Museum, Miami (2009), Hecho en Casa, curated by Osvaldo Sánchez, Museo de Arte Moderno, Mexico City (2009) or Panorama, Bienal de Arte Brasileira, curated by Adriano Pedrosa, Museo de Arte Moderno São Paulo, Brazil (2009).