Mexico City welcomed a new Portal this month at the Museo Laboratorio Arte Alameda located near Alemada Park in the oldest part of the city. The museum is in a colonial church founded in the 16th Century and the Portal sits in an atrium of the church. The site exudes a sense of history and houses technology based contemporary art. Old and new come together, echoing the new connections being bridged between cultures.
The Portal kicked off its new location with a celebratory opening night. Guests enjoyed cocktails and an evening connection with San Francisco. By the end of the night, the partygoers moved inside the Portal for a group picture and the new home was official.
In the following weeks, The Portal welcomed an array of participants, among whom included Ann Ortiz, an artist and art teacher who works with people displaced by the drug war in Mexico; a group of Museologists--those who study the organization, arrangement, and management of museums--who spoke with students at the Portal in Honduras; as well as passersby at the museum who connected with participants in Herat, Afghanistan, each side using their cell phones to share and play popular songs from each country.
This week the Mexico City Portal will be connecting with a new Portal opening in Miami at Art Basel Miami. Each day in the connection between Mexico City and Miami, Mexico will offer an incredible lineup of artists including dancers, photographers, bands, thespians and more. There will be one-on-one encounters as well as 20-25 minute mini-conferences between sites.
Today's featured artists are:
- Andres Gamioca, a painter specializing in collage work and founder of Mexicollage
Many of the artists work will be displayed throughout the week in the atrium where the Mexico City Portal is located. You can hear more stories of the event here and see the coming line up at the Mexico City Portal's Facebook page and Shared_Studios' Instagram.
Portals is a global public art initiative created by Shared_Studios. Repurposed shipping containers are painted gold and equipped with immersive AV technology. Individuals and groups can enter each Portal and converse with a stranger in an identical Portal around the world. They can also collaborate, debate, perform and more. Currently, we have Portals in Afghanistan, Cuba, Honduras, Iran, Jordan, Mexico, the U.S. and Zimbabwe. Our series of posts highlight some of the creative, exciting, moving, mundane, and unexpected encounters from our Portal locations around the world. Stay tuned and come visit us soon!