Grimanesa Amorós
Grimanesa Amorós (born in Lima, Peru) is a Peruvian-American artist known for large-scale light sculpture installations, where she draws inspiration from Peruvian cultural legacies and the communities surrounding her sculptures.
Grimanesa Amorós | |
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![]() Grimanesa Amorós Uros Island, Venice Biennial 2011 | |
Born | Grimanesa Amorós 1962 (age 60–61)[1] |
Nationality | Peruvian-born American |
Known for | Installation art, Light Art |
Notable work | Uros House (2011), Uros Island (2011) "Golden Waters" (2015) "Pink Lotus" (2015) |
Awards | National Endowment for the Arts Visual Artists Fellowship Grant and the Art in Embassies Program |
Website | www |
She has exhibited in Mexico, Tel Aviv, Beijing, and New York's Times Square.
Early life and career
Grimanesa Amorós was born in Lima, Peru, and she became fascinated with drawing maps at a young age. [2] In her teens, she studied psychology and art. She attended the Miguel Gayo Art Atelier in Lima, Peru.[3] When Amorós was eighteen, she exhibited a sold-out show featuring her paintings.[2]
Amorós moved to New York City to work as an artist in the 1980s. Once there, she was awarded a scholarship to study painting and printmaking at the Art Students League of New York.
She started as a painter but later began to create three-dimensional artworks.[2]
Grimanesa Amoro's art plays deftly with the notion that painting and sculpture might come into being through the process of shedding, as opposed to accumulation, the more physical aspects of form, so that the condition in which her subjects are presented does not function as a 'final' state at all, but more like one of several possible chosen moments within which the process of coming-into-being has been captured.[4]
Selected light installations / sculptures
Huanchaco Series
![Glowing red tubes form an open dome in a park at night.](../I/Grimanesa-amoros-bric-hedera-05.jpg.webp)
Golden Array (2021)
Golden Array was commissioned by Jio World Drive for a cultural center in the Bandra Kurla Complex of Mumbai, India. The light sculpture is Amorós’ largest work at three blocks long and three stories high. The sculpture was inspired by the number of telephone lines found on Indian streets.[5]
Argentum (2019)
Argentum was commissioned by the Bronx Museum for their new location at 80 White Street. The work was created in stainless steel, inspired by the material's historic usage in the building and expansion of Manhattan.
Cetha (2019)
Created as part of the artists’ residence at the Civita Institute in Civita Di Bagnoregio. Cetha is a red light sculpture inspired by the ancient Etruscan connection to the sun.
Hedera (2018)
As part of its 40th anniversary, BRIC commissioned HEDERA, a large light installation for Prospect Park in New York. Amorós said she wanted the sculpture to bring viewers closer to a utopia in which people could “celebrate nature, diversity, creativity, and their shared humanity."[6]
![Tubes filled with lavender, gold, and white lights wrap around each other and extend into the distance.](../I/Grimanesa_amoros_ocupante_03.jpg.webp)
Ocupante (2016)
In 2016 she exhibited the work title "Ocupante" at the Ludwig Museum Koblenz. The Ludwig Museum Koblenz exhibited three works of Amorós’ pieces; two large-scale installations and a video with the Spanish title "ocupante" - meaning occupiers or owners.[7]
![Grimanesa Amorós pink lotus peninsula hotel New York](../I/Grimanesa_amoros_pink_lotus_01.jpg.webp)
Pink Lotus (2015)
![](../I/GOLDEN_WATERS_in_Scottsdale%252C_Arizona.jpg.webp)
Created for Breast Cancer Awareness Month LED lights sculpture installed on the Beaux-Arts façade of The Peninsula New York hotel. The artwork highlights the two Roman goddesses on the facade.[8]
Golden Waters (2015)
Golden Waters was inspired waterways constructed by the Hohokam tribe in the 13th century.[9] The sculpture is attached to the Soleri bridge, designed by artist, architect and philosopher Paolo Soleri, and runs parallel to the canal channel eighty feet (24 m) west of the bridge.[10] The LED sculpture is a metaphor for the “shifting balance between the city and nature”.[11]
Breathless Maiden Lane (2014)
![](../I/Amoros_breathless_10.jpg.webp)
Breathless Maiden Laneas an installation in the atrium of 125 Maiden Lane, a glass, marble and granite space in New York's Financial District. Amorós used LED lights, diffusive material, and "bubble" sculptures. The LED tubing was an allusion to reeds that grow in northern Peru, and the bubbles meant to suggest the artificial islands of Lake Titicaca.[12] The light installation is a part of VIP The Armory Show (art fair) event.[13]
![mirror connection cafam museum of cafa Arata Isozaki light installation light art Grimanesa Amorós](../I/Amoros_The_Mirror_Connection_05.jpg.webp)
The Mirror Connection (2013)
The Mirror Connection was a light sculpture installation which was opened June 2, 2013 and ran through June 22nd, 2013.[14] It included exposed circuitry and unpredictable light patterns.[15]
Fortuna (2013)
Fortuna was a temporary site-specific light installation located at Tabacalera in Madrid, Spain. Commissioned by Ministry of Education and Culture in Spain, Fortuna was named after the tobacco brand that was manufactured there in the former factory, La Fragua.[16]
Uros Series
![](../I/Grimanesa-amoros-uros-house-day-1.jpg.webp)
In her lighting sculptures, Amorós returns to the theme of the "Uros Islands", which are a series of floating islands in Lake Titicaca bordering Peru and Bolivia. The islands are made from dried totora reeds by the pre-Incan Uros people.[17] When Amorós first visited the islands, she was struck by "the sense of weightlessness and spiritual connectivity" she experienced by walking on them.[18]
The reeds are also used as a structural material to build everything from houses to boats in the Uros culture. Amorós has incorporated the shapes and patterns of these reeds into her lighting sculptures.
Works in the series include: [19]
![](../I/Grimanesa_Amoros's_Uros_Island_at_the_2011_Biennale_di_Venezia.jpg.webp)
Uros House in Times Square
Part of the Times Square Alliance Public Arts Program[20] in collaboration with The Armory Show (art fair)[21] This piece was later on being exhibited at the Paul and Lulu Hilliard University Art Museum at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette in Lafayette, Louisiana[22] Uros House uses the traditional shape and design of the Uros islands houses to mirror the beauty of sea foam.[23]
Uros Island at the 54th Venice Biennale (2011)
54th International Art Exhibition in Venice, Italy. Part of the Collateral Event FUTURE PASS [24]
Uros Island, an installation by Grimanesa Amorós that was featured at the 54th Venice Biennale's International Art Exhibition.[25] The exhibition traveled to Wereldmuseum in Rotterdam, National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts in Taiwan and Today Art Museum in China.[26]
Uros at Tribeca Issey Miyake (2011)
![](../I/Grimanesa_amoros_issey_miyake_01.jpg.webp)
The bubbles created a tension with the store's exoskeletal designed by Frank Gehry.[27]
Golden Uros as part of the 2011 APART Festival
At the Chapelle de la Persévérance in Tarascon, France [28]
![](../I/Grimanesa_Amoros_Racimo_2011.jpg.webp)
Racimo (2010)
Amorós’ first large-scale lighting sculpture. Commissioned by ICART for Royal Caribbean International to create a lighting sculpture for Allure of the Seas, the largest cruise ship in the world.
Racimo is inspired by the vineyards the artist grew up near.[29]
Collaborations
Amorós collaborated with the Biennale Des Antiquaires at the Grand Palais in Paris, France, to create the lighting sculpture piece, Timeless Motion (In Life and Light).
In 2014, Amorós collaborated with Akiko Elizabeth Maie, the newest label from Nepenthes AMERICA INC., presenting Onkochishin 2014.[30]
![Miranda Grimaensa Amorós video art light between the islands](../I/Amoros_Miranda_Litvak_01.jpg.webp)
Ivri Lider of The Young Professionals and Amorós collaborated on the soundtrack of her video, "Miranda". The video premiered with her sculpture, Light between the Islands in 2013.[31]
![](../I/Grimanesa-amoros-susana-baca-afrodiaspora.jpg.webp)
Amorós worked with Afro-Peruvian singer and Peru's Minister of Culture, Susana Baca, in her video "Between Heaven and Earth". Baca produced an original score for the video, titled "Nacimiento de Voces" ("Birth Voices"). She also produced an interview documentary titled, La Conexion Perfecta de Susana Baca, which was used in Baca's concerts.[32] Amorós' latest collaboration with Baca is the Baca's latest album in 2011, Afrodiaspora, where Amorós designed and used images of her artwork with photos of Susana in the CD packaging.[33]
In her Rootless Algas video, she worked with Hilmar Orn Hilmarsson who produced an original score.[33] The video exhibited with her installation of large multi-colored algae made by casting translucent abaca sheets.
In Reflexion Obscura she worked with José Luis Pardo - multiple-Grammy nominated and Latin Grammy Winning Los Amigos Invisibles on the score.[34]
In La Incubadora she worked with multiple Grammy-nominated Meshell Ndegeocello.[3]
In 2011, she did a special collaboration with fashion designer Manuel Fernandez in his "Fashion Art" show, creating a dress called "Precious Nipples".[35]
Awards and grants
Amorós has received the Bronx Museum of the Arts: AIM Alumni Artist Award (NY), The National Endowment for the Arts Visual Artist Fellowship (Washington, DC), among others.
She was a TED global speaker in 2014.[36]
References
- Puerto, Cecilia (1996). Latin American Women Artists, Kahlo and Look who else: A Selective, Annotated Bibliography. ISBN 9780313289347.
- Grimanesa Amorós Interview by "Asia Sur - Edición Nº 116", Revista Asia Sur, retrieved July 27, 2015
- Grimanesa Amorós Interview by Wynwood Magazine (PDF), Wynwood, retrieved August 24, 2011
- Essay by Dan Cameron (1994), The World
- "Youandimag You & I Monthly Magazine dated Sun, 2 Jan 22".
- "Grimanesa Amorós: HEDERA". BRIC Arts Media. Retrieved 2018-06-01.
- "'Ocupante' Ausstellung im Ludwig Museum Koblenz" ['Ocupante' exhibition at the Ludwig Museum Koblenz]. SWR2 Culture (in German). Retrieved 28 February 2016.
- "Grimanesa Amorós Pink Lotus". The Peninsula New York. Archived from the original on 4 March 2018.
- Slenske, Michael, (June 30, 2015), "Light art illuminates a canal in the desert", Architectural Digest.
- Mufson, Beckett, (June 18, 2015), "Golden Light Flows Like Water in Hanging Installation", The Creators Project
- "Grimanesa Amorós. Golden Waters". Wall Street International. 10 July 2015.
- "Breathless Maiden Lane". Time Art In Buildings.
- "Time Equities Art-in-Buildings Hosts VIP Armory Show on March 8 Maiden Lane". Art PR Wire.
- "GRIMANESA AMORÓS: The Mirror Connection". China Central Academy of Fine Arts, China. Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2015-07-27.
- "Grimanesa Amorós: Luminous Circuitry". Installation Magazine. 21 June 2013. Retrieved 2015-08-07.
- "FORTUNA. Grimanesa Amorós". The Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports, Spain. Retrieved 2015-07-27.
- Provence Ventoux: Le Blog, archived from the original on March 16, 2012, retrieved August 24, 2011
- "Aracari Fostering Creativity: Inspiration for Artist Grimanesa Amorós", The Khipu Blog, 22 April 2013
- Golden Uros article by Provence Ventoux: Le Blog, archived from the original on March 16, 2012, retrieved August 24, 2011
- "The Times Square Armory Show". Time Square Arts. Retrieved 2015-07-27.
- "Five Major Public Art Sculptures Unveiled in Times Square", The Official Site of Time Square, archived from the original on 2017-06-28, retrieved 2020-08-29
- "Fall 2011", Paul and Lulu Hilliard University Art Museum
- "UROS HOUSE by Grimanesa Amorós at Time Square, Father Duffy Square, New York". wescover.com. Retrieved 2018-03-14.
- Grimanesa Amorós Website Uros Island, Wynwood, retrieved August 24, 2011
- Platt, Kevin Holden,"Grimanesa Amorós: Sculpting with Light and Video", Yuan Space
- "Future Pass – From Asia to the World, International Art @ La Biennale di Venezia". Ganzo. Retrieved 2015-07-27.
- "The Artist Behind the Light Installation at Tribeca Issey Miyake". Hyperallergic. 23 December 2011. Retrieved 2011-12-23.
- "Festival APART 2011" (PDF). A-PART Art Festival.
- Grimanesa Amorós Racimo InterviewGrimanesa Amorós Interview, retrieved August 24, 2011
- "Grimanesa Amorós and Akiko Elizabeth Maie: Onkochishin 2014". Musée Magazine. Archived from the original on 2015-03-24. Retrieved 2020-08-29.
- Farver, Jane, (2013), "Grimanesa Amorós’ Light between the Islands", Litvak Gallery
- Grimanesa Amorós, "Between Heaven Heaven and Earth" and La Conexion Perfecta de Susana Baca video Grimanesa Amorós website video page
- Grimanesa Amorós, "Between Heaven Heaven and Earth" and Afrodiaspora CD album Grimanesa Amorós Afrodiaspora page Archived 2011-10-07 at the Wayback Machine
- "REFLEXION OBSCURA", YouTube, archived from the original on 2021-12-20
- Valrie Gladstone, NY Times In Transit Outside Madrid, Celebrating a Fashion Designer Who Embraces Art
- "Following the lights | Grimanesa Amorós - YouTube". YouTube.
External links
- Official website
- Nina Menocal Gallery Archived 2012-03-31 at the Wayback Machine
- Arte Al Limite