Iván Navarro

Iván Navarro, Mental Spaces I
Photo Credit: Gallery Hyundai

Iván Navarro (b. 1972, Santiago, Chile) grew up in the brutal regime of military dictator Augusto Pinochet. Pinochet is a person who gained notoriety for ruthlessly suppressing anti-government protesters and political opponents while ruling Chile for 17 years after taking office in a coup d'état in 1973. He often enforced curfews and power outages to isolate citizens in their homes and limit their outdoor activities. This childhood memory of controlling the public with light became the subject and material of Iván Navarro's works. He uses fluorescent lights, neon lights, and mirrors that emit light, reflect and magnify it to produce his works. What should be noted is that the artist not only accuses the dark history and reality through this, but also shows the longing for freedom, hope, and the liberation that was eventually achieved. To him, light is a symbol of hope and itself. Currently active in New York, the artist has exhibited at major art institutions and galleries, such as the Museum of Contemporary Art Miami (MOCA, Miami), Venice Biennale (Venice), and Paul Kasmin Gallery (New York).

The artist's works are represented by the Saatchi Collection (London), Fonds National d'Art Contemporain (Paris), LVMH Collection (Paris), Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden (Washington), It is owned by famous art institutions and collectors, such as the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (Virginia). The artist's work was exhibited in Madison Square Park, New York in 2014 under the title 'This Land Is Your Land'. This exhibition, in which messages consoling the difficult lives of immigrants are written in neon on a large water tower, is generating a hot response in the local area, further solidifying the artist's position.