Juan Ortiz-Apuy primarily focuses on language as the basis for his artistic practice.  Tracing a path from language as symbol to object and back again the mind of Ortiz-Apuy stumbles on the limitations and dead ends of words, positioning them as aesthetic devices that serve to root out, conceal, avoid and exploit meaning.  His latest project reproduces pages of a CIA manual that was air dropped over Latin American countries during the 1980s into seventeen individual prints. The CIA’s Freedom Fighter Manual was originally printed in Spanish with cartoonish pictographs explaining actions that could be used to rebel against the government.  It was later translated to English when it became declassified by court order. It exemplifies language as a place of struggle, where exchanges between identity and violence occur. By focusing on this publication Ortiz-Apuy delves into the archaeology of language, exploring its capacity to create images and representations of rebellion and compliance, darkness and whiteness, power and weakness. The Freedom Fighter Manual is a reactive exhibition where the viewer is charged with activating and de-activating the work. Sensor operated security lights dispersed throughout the blacked out gallery are triggered by the viewer’s movement. The paradoxical situation of an illuminated space revealing blank prints is thickened when the spectator causes darkness to resume.    (taken from press release)

Ehibition: January 20th – February 27th, 2011
Vernissage: January 20th, 2011 6-9PM

Galerie Push
Space  425
Juan Ortiz Apuy
The Freedom Fighter Manual
January 20th – February 27th, 2011
http://galeriepush.com