26th ANNUAL NO DEAD ARTISTS
International Juried Exhibition of Contemporary Art
August 31 – October 22, 2022
Pull Quote
My art practice is like an euthanasia to Modernity while being pregnant of its baby
Biography
Carlos Salazar-Lermont (Caracas, Venezuela, 1987) practice is focused on performativity and socially engaged art. He received his MFA in Visual Arts from the Sam Fox School of Design and Visual Arts at Washington University in St. Louis, where he won the Danforth Scholarship. He has a BFA in Sculpture from UNEARTE (2012), a Technical Highschool degree on Fine Arts in Drawing and Painting from the Escuela de Artes Visuales Cristóbal Rojas (2005), and a Dual MA in Arts Administration & Policy and Modern and Contemporary Art History in the School of the Art Institute (SAIC) wich he earned with the support of the New Artists Society scholarship.
In 2013 he was distinguished with an Honourable Mention in the XVI Jóvenes con FIA Salon and in 2014 with the Salón Jóvenes con FIA 2.0/3 Prize. He also received an Honorable Mention for curating Desafío al Poder, framed in the International Contemporary Art Biennial of Los Andes. His work has been shown in several international events as Experiencias de la Carne (Lima y Trujilo, Perú, 2015), Soap Box Sessions (London, United Kingdom, 2015), PAEkort #14 (Rotterdam, Netherlands, 2014), Rapid Pulse International Performance Art Festival (Chicago, United States, 2013, 2017), TRAMPOLIM_plataforma do encontro con a arte de performance (Vitoria, Brazil, 2011), NADAQUEVER (Argentina, 2011), HORASperdidas (Monterrey, México, 2010), and Performar (Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, 2009). Some of the national performance art events of which he has been part in Venezuela are ID performance, Encuentro de Arte Corporal, Velada de Santa Lucía, Fugaz: Feria de Performance del Estado Lara, NOMASDECINCO, PerfoChoroní, and many others. In 2014, Salazar-Lermont started P3 Plataforma Para Performance organization, to impulse the creation, dissemination, research, and education focused on Performance Art. In 2015, he created the International Performance Art Biennial of Caracas. At SAIC and Washington University in St. Louis he has been distinguished with over a dozen awards. Some of them are the Student Leadership Award, the Enrichment Fund Grant, and the Graduate Curatorial Fellowship (SAIC) and the Graduate Production Grant twice, CityStudioSTL, Community Partnership, and the John T. Miliken Foreign Travel Award (Wash U).
He lives and works in Chicago, IL and St. Louis, MO, United States.
Artist Statement
Use as few elements as possible
Present clearly defined actions and materials to enhance real or suggested performativity
Proximity—literal, figurative—increases tension, and engagement
Materials are a discourse. The body is a material
Vulnerability is a strength
Address Venezuela’s historical circumstances by deconstructing the social, politic, and economic fabrics
Subvert the burden of Catholicism’s culture of self-sacrifice and martyrdom
Reflect on the awareness of our own death, as a path to make sense out of existence
Show the paradoxes of economic value, through everyday social dynamics
You have permission to laugh
If that does not convince you, try this one:
Art express what philosophy and science cannot because Art can express contradiction
Matter is contradictory
Performance Art is contradictory
Latin America is contradictory
Venezuela is contradictory
USA is contradictory
Life is contradictory
Human Nature is contradictory
I am contradictory
Everything I say about my work is true, but it is also a lie
If that does not work either, try this other one:
My subconscious makes my work for me
I read the Bible
I listen to Gregorian Chants
I read about Latin American economy and its historical failures
I visualize the making in my mind. Then I go directly to the making
I use ephemeral materials very often because life is ephemeral very often
The form is brief because my attention is brief
The content is labyrinthic because my thought is labyrinthic
If that is still not clear, this could be helpful:
My art practice is like an euthanasia to Modernity while being pregnant of its baby
CV
EDUCATION
2022 MFA in Visual Arts, Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts. Washington University in
St. Louis. St. Louis, MO.
2019 MA in Arts Administration & Policy. School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Chicago, IL
2019 MA in Modern and Contemporary Art History. School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Chicago, IL
2012 BFA Visual Arts, Sculpture Major. Universidad Nacional Experimental de las Artes. Caracas, Venezuela.
ARTIST RESIDENCIES
2019 ACRE Residency. ACRE, WI, USA
2017 Rosekill. Upstate, NY, USA
SOLO SHOWS
2019 Ecclesiastés 1:2, Chuquimarca Projects. Chicago, USA
2008 EGO: El Gran Orgullo, Galería Espacio 3. Universidad Nacional Experimental de las Artes.
GROUP EXHIBITIONS AND EVENTS (SELECTION)
2022 9 Ways from Sunday, Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum, St. Louis, MO
2022 Tomorrow, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Design Museum of Chicago, Chicago, IL
2022 ArteLatinx, University of Nebraska in Omaha and Gallery 1516, Omaha, NE
2022 Dosciento treinta y… Espacio Proyecto Libertad, Mérida, Venezuela
2021 Parabola 2021, Des Lee Gallery. St. Louis, MO
2019 Inclusion, Facet Gallery. Atlanta, GA.
2018 Living Architecture, 6018 North. Chicago, IL
2018 Art Book Fair. MoMA PS1, New York, USA
2017 Rapid Pulse International Performance Art Festival 2017, Dfbrl8r Performance
Art Gallery. Chicago, USA
Cuerpo/ Medio/ Poder, Cinemateca Distrital. Bogotá, Colombia