Studio Lecture Series: rafa esparza
355 Roth Way, Stanford, CA 94305
Oshman Hall
Made possible by the Millicent Greenwell Clapp Studio Art Series Fund, this series invites an artist each quarter for a two-day visit consisting of studio critiques with our MFA students and an evening public lecture. This series continues to provide a dynamic platform for artists to engage with the Stanford community, fostering critical dialogue and creative exploration.
A Matter of Absence, Presence and Continuity.
The lecture will situate my practice as a process that contends with the violence of colonization as an ongoing process that erases, disappears, forces migration, and articulates culture under a Eurocentric paradigm. The lecture will move through past and current art works, relative research and reference material to discuss how different processes, be it live performance, installation, sculpture, painting, collaboration and material experiments have allowed me to embody various proximities to histories, material, historic and contemporary objects. These proximities allow for a probing of speculative spaces that can reveal potential simultaneous, and parallel realities of those items and events in question outside of whats on record.
rafa esparza (b. 1981, Los Angeles; lives and works in Los Angeles) received a BA from University of California, Los Angeles (2011). Solo and two-person exhibitions have been held at Commonwealth and Council, Mexico City (2024); Artists Space, New York (2023); Commonwealth and Council, Los Angeles (2021); MASS MoCA, North Adams (2019); ArtPace, San Antonio (2018); and Ballroom Marfa (2017). Selected group exhibitions have been held at Oakland Museum of California (2024); Museum of Contemporary Art Denver (2023); San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (2023); Commonwealth and Council, Mexico City (2022); Museum of Contemporary Art Tucson (2022); Moody Center for the Arts, Rice University, Houston (2020); San Diego Art Institute (2019); Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (2017); and Hammer Museum, Los Angeles (2016). esparza is a recipient of Pérez Prize (2022), Latinx Arts Fellowship, Mellon Foundation (2021), Lucas Artist Fellowship (2020), Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award (2017), Art Matters Foundation Grant (2014), and California Community Foundation Fellowship for Visual Artists (2014). esparza has participated in residencies at Artpace San Antonio (2018) and Wanlass Artist in Residence, OXY ARTS, Los Angeles (2016).
esparza’s work is in the collections of Aïshti Foundation, Beirut; AltaMed Art Collection, Los Angeles; Dallas Museum of Art; Kadist Art Foundation; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; Minneapolis Institute of Art; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; San Jose Museum of Art; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Vincent Price Art Museum, Monterey Park; and Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.
Photo credit: Max Knight
VISITOR INFORMATION: Oshman Hall is located within the McMurtry Building on Stanford campus at 355 Roth Way. Visitor parking is available in designated areas and is free after 4pm on weekdays. Alternatively, take the Caltrain to Palo Alto Transit Center and hop on the free Stanford Marguerite Shuttle. If you need a disability-related accommodation or wheelchair access information, please contact Julianne Garcia at juggarci [at] stanford.edu (juggarci[at]stanford[dot]edu). This event is open to Stanford affiliates and the general public. Admission is free.
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