Rodrigo Valenzuela
I situate my creative practice within the contradicting traditions of documentary and fiction through video, photography and installation. I construct narratives, scenes and stories which point to the tensions found between the individual and communities. I utilize autobiographical threads to inform larger universal fields of experience. Gestures of alienation and displacement are both the aesthetic and subject of much of my work. Often using desert landscapes and tableaus with day labors or myself I explore the way an image is inhabited, and the way that spaces and people are translated into images. My work serves as an expressive and intimate point of contact between the broader realms of subjectivity and political contingency. Through my videos and photographs, I make images that feel at the same time familiar yet distant, I engage the viewer in questions concerning the ways in which the formation and experience of each work is situated – how they exist in and out of place.
Rodrigo Valenzuela is a Chilean artist living between Houston and Seattle. Rodrigo holds a BFA in photography from The University of Chile , a BA in Philosophy from The Evergreen State College and an MFA in Photomedia from the University of Washington. He is currently a Core Fellow at the museum of fine arts in Houston, His work has been shown at MOCA Miami, National Academy museum in New York, North Dakota museum of art, Henry art gallery, El museo cultural de Santa Fe, COCA Seattle and more. Rodrigo is also an alumni of the Skowhegan school of painting and sculpture , Vermont studio center, Bemis center for contemporary art and Clark college. During 2015 Rodrigo will have solo shows at the Contemporary art museum in Santiago, Chile, The Frye art museum in Seattle WA and UPFOR gallery in Portland, OR.