K R A M E R  G A R F I A S

Fanciful fringes vie with austere clarity, embroideries on a plane with objects crafted in the round. The variety of textile works is vast, ranging from geometrically ordered weavings in two dimensions to free forms in space. The exhibition shows anonymous pieces side by side with well-known positions such as those of Gunta Stölzl and Elsi Giauque.

This results in some surprising adjacencies of comparable perspectives from different periods. What all the works have in common is a powerfully creative hand and, resonating within it, a touch of magic. Quiet statements as well as the occasional activist message enhance the pulling power of these textile creations. Bound together by the softness of their materials and choice of techniques, the exhibits are interwoven in an impressive overall experience.

Other monumental new fiber works take Magellan at his word. These are figures woven according to the scale of the people he described, but stripped of their racialized features and cloaked in Kramer Garfias’ fashionably loose threads as opposed to animal fur.

Beyond her deconstructive methods, her constructive ones begin with studied engagement with indigenous knowledge systems. She is particularly interested in the cosmological worldview of autochthonous communities, often deeply rooted in a spiritual relationship with the surrounding natural environment. In these cultures, intimacy with plants and animals and knowledge of nature’s cycles and hidden languages is dutifully passed down through generations. In direct opposition to European and American conceptions of civilization; plants, animals, landscapes, and seasons are not regarded merely as resources to be tapped. Instead, they are co-journers and co-stewards of Earthly knowledge and histories. The resulting close relationship between people and their surroundings is reflected in how those cultures conceive of territory: not as static places with violently-guarded boundaries, but as living spaces shaped by collective rituals, narratives, and memory.

From this perspective,backwards along the riverroundly dismisses the conquistadores as arbiters of Patagonian history, permitting its kaleidoscopic primordial truths to flourish.

Backwards along the river

7th February - 29th March 2025

Gallery Kendra Jayne Patrick
Schanzeneckstrasse 3, Bern

Opening hours

Friday & Saturday 12 am – 18 pm

In "Ha! Patagón!" Kramer Garfias deliberately subverts this tradition. She uses synthetic raffia yarn instead of precious materials and introduces playful elements, such as woven erasures of symbols of power on the world map. These choices dispossess the tapestry medium of its authority and question its role in supporting dominant narratives.

The Chilean artist makes her intent clear: to expose the colonial stories shaped by Magellan and replace them with space for new, postcolonial perspectives.

Ha! Patagón!

curated by Yara Sonseca Mas
29 November 2024 – 30 January 2025

Instituto Cervantes 
Alfons-Goppel-Straße 7, Munich

Opening hours

Mon – Thu 10 am – 6 pm
Friday 10 am – 2 pm

With the support of the Chilean Consulate General in Munich.

Exhibiting artists

LAUREN BACCUS

NUVEEN BARWARI

WILLIAM BIGBY

SOPHIA MAINKA

IAN O´HARA

DIANA SINCLAIR

MALAIKA TEMBA

CONSTANZA CAMILA KRAMER GARFIAS

The jury consists of Mon Muellerschoen (Art Consultant), Petra Winter (Madame), Dominik Reiner (GM Mandarin Oriental), Julia von Jenisch (Chairwoman of the Förderkreis Deichtorhallen), Janna-Lena Baierle (HISCOX), Nicoline Wöhrle (WALA Foundation & Dr. Hauschka), Sophie Neuendorf (Artnet), Prof. Dr. Dirk Boll (Christies), Ira Stehmann (Gallery Owner & Curator), Ingrid Lohaus (Galerie LOHAUS SOMINSKY), Prof. Dr. Jetta Frost (Vice President Excellence University of Hamburg), Dr. Michael Zoller (Curt Wills Foundation) and Kristina Tröger (CeU President).

Prof. Dr. Dirk Boll, Deputy Chairman 20th & 21st Century Art, Christie’s, will give the keynote speech. The festive award ceremony took place on October 14, 2024 at the „Hotel Mandarin Oriental“ in Munich at 6 pm with members and selected guests

The exhibition promotes and elevates the work of contemporary artists who are in conversation with the traditional technical definition of tapestry upon which the American Tapestry Alliance was founded. Beyond: Tapestry Expanded not only expands the technical definition of tapestry within a post-colonial perspective but also builds an intergenerational conversation that spans across a spectrum of multicultural identities and lived experiences.

Exhibiting artists

Abbey Muza, Anne Wilson, Bryana Bibbs, Christina Forrer, Christy Matson, Crystal Gregory, Danielle Andress, Diana Guerrero-Macia, Dianna Frid, Hope Wang, Janice Lessman-Moss, Jacqueline Surdell, Jovencio de la Paz, kg gnatowski, Kira Dominguez Hultgren, Delaina Doshi, Lia Cook, Marianne Fairbanks, Melissa Leandro, Olivia Valentine, Olive Stefanski, Qualeasha Wood, Susie Taylor, Tanya Aguiñiga, Yasmin Spiro, C. Pazia Mannella, Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias, Jacobo Alonso, Jennifer Robertson, Kate Nartker, Linda Sok, Rose Dickson, Sarah Stefana Smith, Theda Sandiford, Wlodzimierz Cygan, and Xia Gao.

"Wilde Welten. Nature and Movement in Art" offers an insight into the connection between art and nature and shows how movement and wildness can be expressed in creative processes. It invites the viewers to adopt new perspectives and discover the infinite possibilities of artistic interpretation of the natural world.

Exhibiting artists

Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias

Ruscha Voormann

Lena Keller

Sujin Kim

Eduardo Palomares

Aline Schweizer

Thank you, Kunstverein Rosenheim, for inviting me to this year's KUNST AKTUELL, which we celebrated on Saturday, June 8th, 2024, at the Städtische Galerie Rosenheim.

I am more than happy to present my large-format work, Fox (2023), in the rooms of the Städtische Galerie, which you can see until July 21st. The Kunst Aktuell exhibition is one of the most comprehensive and essential overviews of contemporary art, which the Kunstverein Rosenheim curates yearly.

The exhibition includes both regional and national artists—established artistic positions as well as young, qualified new discoveries.

KUNST AKTUELL  annual exhibition

Kunstverein Rosenheim

at Städtische Galerie Rosenheim

Max-Bram-Platz 2

OPENING HOURS

Tue  -  Sun  13 - 17 Uhr

The artist uses yarns and threads like painting or sculpting material. In Kramer Garfia‘s „Drift“ series of works, a flat-woven sculpture depicts a motor block whose force makes the fabric vibra- te even though it hangs motionless in the stret- cher frame. Two drifting cars perform a ballet on an extended 4.2-meter-wide Jacquard weaving (lead/chase), the speed of which is captivating even when the work material is stationary. These works impressively demonstrate what the artist‘s woven works can achieve: They challenge how we see and feel. One of the most striking aspects of Kramer Garfias‘ work is her ability to convey movement and energy through textiles bringing Swabian Drift Foxe‘s cars back to life.

Each artwork is meticulously crafted, with lay- ers of texture and color that mimic the swirling patterns of smoke and tire tracks left by drifting cars, bringing the dynamism and energy of the sport to life.

Text by Mon Muellerschoen

The automobiles glide and pirouette with grace across wet surfaces, creating, as Kramer Garfias puts it, “a magical moment when an everyday object transforms into a performance.” Their shapes, replete with visible scars and damage from previous races, blur and distort from turning so quickly. This image is hard to follow with the eye, but its compelling dynamism enthralled her so much that she wanted to capture it in her art. 

The Autodrift textiles are complex and changeable depending on the vantage point of the viewer. Kramer Garfias uses a special technique on jacquard, which is normally made in a standard square format based on its loom, to create more organic forms. The artist drafts and designs her textiles, collaborating with the high-end producers Tessitura Taborelli to bring them to fruition. Once she receives the fabric, Kramer Garfias deconstructs its surface, creating wavy edges and freehanging fringe and adding metallic accents. The result are objects of astonishing beauty, scale, and vitality, the remains of an ephemeral moment.

Born in Chile, Kramer Garfias now lives and works in Munich. She holds a Master of Arts in Conceptual Textiles from the University of Arts and Design Burg Giebichenstein in Saale, Germany. Eat, Sleep, Drift, and Repeat showcases her recent creations from the Autodrift series and runs from November 23 through January 9, 2023, at Gallery PERG, located at Asperger Str. 12, 71634, Ludwigsburg, Germany.

Text by Amelia Kutschbach

In the next room, the artist presents a new installation that refers to centuries-old weaving traditions of the Andes region. The pictorial fabric of the work contains Mapuche patterns as well as depictions of weavers working with traditional hand-weaving techniques. Kramer Garfias thus destillates the collective character and communitas of weaving groups: because weaving is a practice based on knowledge and technique sharing, on mutual support and help within the respective group.

EXHIBITING ARTISTS

Lukas Hoffmann

An Laphan

Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias

EXHIBITING ARTISTS

Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias

Teresa Baker
Sharona Franklin

EXHIBITION DATES

VIP PREVIEW 29. + 30.11.2022
PUBLIC DAYS 01. - 03.12.2022

LOCATION

MIAMI BEACH Convention Center

Nova Section

"Transforming Leadership, Securing our Future" is the theme of the BMW Foundation Responsible Leaders Hub during the Munich Security Conference 2023. In the digital age, this transformation has an unprecedented urgency. Leaders today find themselves confronted with the demand to continually readjust and retool, as our world and with it our possibilities to shape the future are changing at tremendous speed, New technologies, political disruptions, dwindling resources, and other parameters from the fluid framework for a future that everybody would like to have all nicely planned and secured.

For all our efforts to secure the future, it ultimately remains hidden, and there is no such thing as a universal vantage point: Looking to and into the future is highly contingent on where we are looking.

The exhibition Hidden Future wants to present non-linear and surprising ways of visualizing the fundamentally hidden future and rendering it emotionally tangible. Hidden Future on Prater Island showcases works by three artists and an artist duo from different generations and different backgrounds but all working and living in Bavaria.

In her Work "Autobahn Evolution - Generation Overload" (2022), Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias deals with the emergence of a fictive evolution by mixing and enhancing textile objects. The artist says about her work: "Taking the exploration of reproduction and DNA as its framework, the project critically inquiries into genetic engineering, for example in animals and plants. The aesthetic language deliberately draws a line of connection to the automotive industry."

Text by Mon Muellerschoen

EXHIBITING ARTISTS

Jusha and Sven Müller

Esther Zahel

Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias

Cigdem Aky

Based on the title quotation of the mystic Teresa of Ávila, whose thoughts on the role of women have lost none of their topicality even after 400 years, the exhibition offers a multitude of starting points for discussions about being a woman worldwide and at any time: What makes a woman? What are the social expectations? What attributes do we attach to women? What role does the female body play?

These questions in an international and supra-temporal context lead to diverse answers, which the artists negotiate individually and in different media. At the same time, the works open up the possibility to question opinions and role models, deal with social norms, and illuminate completely new aspects of being a woman beyond conventional perspectives. What all the artworks have in common is that they offer the audience low-threshold food for thought and material for subsequent discussions. What a welcome opportunity to talk about definitions of femininity in general and in particular.

The SALOON Network fosters a community within the art world that exchanges ideas and expertise and encourages the creation of collabo- rations and projects. The members are women-identifying and non-binary who are curators, artists, gallerists, and other professionals in the arts.

A group exhibition of SALOON Munich in cooperation with Schwere-Reiter-Theater, supported by SALOON Network, BBK Bayern, and Gogia Fine Art Logistics.

Text by Saloon Network Munich

EXHIBITING ARTISTS

Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias, Nina Aeberhard, Veronika Dräxler, Mariella Kerscher, Silvia Gardini, Brenda Franco, Sandra Bejarano & Lilian Robl

Saloon Munich Board: Eva Lengler / Curator: Cordula Gielen

LOCATION

Schwere-Reiter-Theater, Munich

"All senses are lost" exhibition view; Photos by Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias

All senses are lost is Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias’ first exhibition in which she explicitly approaches gender debates. Starting point of her artistic contemplation is the discrepancy in the translation between the self-constructed image and the male-dominated representation of female figures. The artist takes up an Instagram meme from 2010 which juxtaposes two photographs of saint Teresa of Avilà (1515-1582) and former Disney star Lindsay Lohan (*1986). Whilst Avilà is sculpted in The Rapture of Saint Teresa (1645-1652) by Gian Lorenzo Bernini in a state of transverberation, paparazzi shots caught Lohan 2007 in a moment of intoxicated ecstasy. Instrumentalized by the male subject, attributes such as passivity, dependence and vulnerability are constructed as guiding principles of female existence. Both, are depleted of their lived experience and senses.

In Transverberation Constanza reanimates autonomously Avilà’s self-determined voice fighting for democratizing the Catholic doctrine. Her woven appearance in the RGB color model is pixelated and made to flicker. In A little more personal Lohan’s face is placed in Avilà’s kerchief making the two figures melt together. By using digital techniques of tumbling, hyperlinking and coding Constanza pushes not only the fabric but also the loom to technical and aesthetic limits.

One of the result are floating yarns that create a visual disturbance which resonate the beholders’ confusion about the figure’s identity. In the artist’s first video work Keep a watch on: self-monitoring Constanza deliberately exposes herself to the still male-dominated voyeuristic gaze of the camera. She retains control over what becomes visible and what remains invisible as her body alternately moves into the light beam and disappears into darkness again.In the tension between self-determined objectification and what the camera lens seeks to capture, the artist questions whether feminism as a theme should be evoked, exposed and/or even negated.

Does revisiting feminist thought lead to its incorporation or does it let patriarchal structures stagnate? Can the perpetuum mobile of female objectification ever be brought to a halt? Constanza’s cross-cultural referencing, non-linear historicity, and deconstruction of the weave’s material specificity are queering techniques that make seemingly stable (normative) structures become unstable.

Text by Lorena Harauzek

ALL SENSES ARE LOST - solo exhibition 

curated by Lorena Harauzek

NODEPRESSIONroom 

Dachauer Str. 157 Munich

13 05 2022 - 22 05 2022

Opening 

12 05 2022  18 - 21 Uhr

Albert Camus (1913 - 1960) poses a crucial question: Is it possible for humans to act in an ethical and meaningful manner in a silent universe? According to him, the answer is yes. The experience and awareness of the absurd create moral values and also set up the limits of our actions. Camus separates the modern form of rebellion into two modes.

First, there is the metaphysical rebellion, "the movement by which man protests against his condition and the whole of creation." The other mode, the "historical rebellion" is the attempt to materialize the abstract spirit of metaphysical rebellion and change the world. In this attempt, the rebel must balance between the evil of the world and the intrinsic evil, which every revolt carries and not cause any unjustifiable suffering.  (Text by Venetia Initiatives)

"Quieter than Silence" - Part B

March 3 - April 16, 2022

curated by Venetia Kapernekas

PRESENTING

Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias

Anna Conway

Shirine Gill

Marius Glauer

Joanna Malinowska

Jenny Min 

LOCATION

Greenwich Street, New York 

"Mega Atobaahn", 2022, Jacquardweave and metal chains, 130 x 110 cm; a.topos exhibition view

Photos by Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias

a.topos Venice for the second edition of THE CREATIVE ROOM, invited artists to dedicate their art to the theme "The Future of Art and the Art of the Future".  
 

The artists involved are:  Mário Afonso, Damiano Fasso, Lina Zylla, Sève Favre, Sarah Valente, Doris Schamp, Madalena Corrêa Mendes, Armin Amiriam, Lucrezia Costa, Oona Nelson, Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias, Jia-Rey Chang, Elena Xausa e Lorenzo Fonda, Nero Cosmos, Veronika Dräxler, Adélaïde Feriot, Chiara Tubia, Degann, David Michel Fayek, Ian Callender, Finn Theuws, Anna Maconi, Tanguy de Thuret, Lorenzo Peluffo e Fortuna De Nardo, Bernardo Tirabosco, Fadwa Rouhana, Daniela Di Lullo.  

 For almost two years, the majority of the world’s population was unable to attend any exhibition in a physical space. This new reality was unsurprisingly accompanied by an intense discussion around some of the hottest topics of the period in the art scene - is the virtual realm better than real-world exhibitions? Will digital replace experiencing a show live? Are we witnessing the establishment of a new normal, with the rise of new media hegemony in artistic practice? 
 
 Many extensive debates, strained relationships, repetitive arguments and, most of all, many, many, many online exhibitions after, we can take a deep breath and admit that - besides its undeniable contribution to the democratization of Art - virtual is definitely better than nothing. Hopefully, we can also foresee an art scene where both, digital and real, can, if not live happily ever after, at least find a way to peacefully (and in a mutually beneficial way) cohabit. After so much time apart, it’s nice to explore the possibility of encounters. Utopia, Dystopia, and Retrotopia  are two of them. 

Utopia, Dystopia, Retrotopia

The artworks gathered here are an array of different interpretations about the future, converging into an enlarged horizon of expectation; an immersion in a compelling mixture between optimistic prognosis, cynical readings of the future and a nostalgic dive into a longing - either experienced or idealized - past.

Opening the narrative, the first show harvests works of art offering either utopic sceneries or gateways to a dystopian tomorrow. The audience is presented with an exhibition path that creates visual and sound spaces shifting between an invitation to sail together instead of adrift or attesting the burden of times to come. 

In the second exhibit, a world struck by an appalling pandemic and an art scene flooded with NTFs as backdrop brings past and future to walk sideways in what Zigmund Bauman defined as retrotopia. Either through form, content or both, the displayed artworks depict a strive to (re)establish a mityfied  - even if unfaithful - past. And in case nostalgically revisting a longing time does not chase uncertainty away, art can at least attempt righteous grief.

Exhibition curated by a.topos Venice, THE CREATIVE ROOM #2 has been organized in collaboration with Portrait Eyewear and Demoni Danzanti  creative residency.

EXHIBITION DATES

3–13 March 2022
17-27 March 2022
 

LOCATION

SPARC* Spazio Arte Contemporanea
Campo Santo Stefano 2828A

30124 Venezia

Installationview "Misiones - Espero que los condores vengan a comerme", 2021, 130 x 130 x 140 cm, Wood & Jacquardweaves, exhibition pictures by Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias

“Chilean Conexión” is an exhibition of Chilean artists living in Berlin that aim to disseminate and increase the visibility of the work being developed by many migrating national artists in the German capital, with hopes to facilitate a meeting and connection between them and also within the local community.

Since the Berlin Wall fell down, many Chilean artists and musicians have been relocating to the German capital, seduced by an effervescent artistic and musical scene, and for social-cultural relations that entice them to this particular city. These migrant artists often go unnoticed due to both their youth and also the large number of artists and musicians who arrive each year in the city, competing for the same workspaces and exhibitions.

A group of them was invited for the first time in 2018 to exhibit part of the works they have been developing here, in a small collective exhibition. About 30 artists of different diciplines were presented in a single night, being received with a massive attendance of the Chilean community and also the local public.

In this 4th edition, the objective is to expand and consolidate the exhibition, with more works and categories on display, which will include: the visual arts, video art, installations, acoustic projects and performances, in addition to several workshops, several of them supporting foreign artists. 

Ambactia* Memoria is a group exhibition to be presented at SomoS Art House Berlin between September 7-18th 2021. Ambactia Memoria offers artists, critics, and activists an open framework to articulate non-normative artistic positions and peripheral perspectives regarding tradition, memory, and identities in relation to the Hispanic. By exploring the intersection between feminism, transculturalism and (post) migrant approaches on the representations, practices and diverse forms of identity in contemporary society, works selected deconstruct the idea of Hispanicness and collectively imagine its future transformation. 

"Constanza Camila Kramer Garfias (HYPERISM) intensively examines her roots and the development of textile projects from postcolonialism, with a flag reappropriated by the Mapuche people since their colonization. This reappropriation of derogatory or traditionally questionable symbols (as the term queer by the LGBTIQ+ community was at the time) is installed in the interstices of irony as a political device for social activation, as evidenced by the actions of the Homo Velamine collective." 

Curated by Vanesa Peña Alarcón (ES), the exhibition takes as a starting point an institutional critique of the global stereotypical representation of the Hispanic by international diplomatic organizations and cultural institutes. In Peña’s view, this representation of the Hispanic or the concept of Hispanicness, is a form of patronization of people’s history, collective memory, and subjectivities, a one-sided perspective that doesn’t allow for a genuine inclusion of transculturalism. Curated by Vanesa Peña Alarcón

It is a great honor to announce this new exhibition in Japan. For a whole month, the Art Museum in Takaoka City exhibits one HYPERISM artwork as part of the International KOGEI Award from Toyama. The Takaoka Art Museum, which opened in 1951, was moved and rebuilt in September 1994. The Art Museum aims to give a platform to traditional arts and crafts and offers extensive art activities to Takaokas Citizens.

The famous "Fujio F. gallery" in the Museum presents many original Doraemon drawings by renowned Takaoka-born artist-duo Fujiko Fujio.

The exhibition runs from the 10th of April till the 5th of May 2021.

Exhibition pictures with the kind support of the Takaoka Art Museum team, 2021, Takaoka, Japan; Photo source: Wikipedia.com

All pictures by KOGEI Award team in Toyama, 2021, Japan

Thank you so much to ART IN AMERICA and chief-editor Emily Watlington for featuring me as one of 20 international artists in this year's New Talent Issue.

A huge thanks to Emily Mc Dermott for the great interview and fabulous article. I am glad to have been published with so many great artists! Enjoy reading it.