Concerto in C: Esteban Schimpf

Press Release

la BEAST gallery is thrilled to announce ‘Concerto in C’, a multidisciplinary exhibition brought to life by artist Esteban Schimpf.

Marking a significant shift in his practice, this presentation is a thoughtful assemblage of musical composition, earthenware sculpture, and site-specific documentation. Together, these elements establish a unified framework in which sound and environment are held in direct relation, echoing traces of childhood memory, heritage, and sustained artistic pursuit.

Artist Statement

“I tell the Kogi Mamo that the city where I live is burning. Through his translator, I try to explain what Los Angeles is. He looks at the ground and traces a circle into the earth with a stick. He says the Earth has to eat. He warns that if we do not feed the Earth, the Earth will eat what it needs. He tells me that in the North we do not feed the Earth. All we do is eat.

In Colombia, an ofrenda is a material act. It is not an explanation or a solution. It is something placed into the world and left there. Long before borders, offerings were made as a way of remaining in relation to land, to time, to forces that exceed human scale.

This is my ofrenda. It consists of a chorus of masks I made from barro rojo in Mexico. A long-form musical composition I have been writing over the last three years. An audio system assembled to make that sound physical.

Most of this work traveled north to arrive here. It crossed borders, arriving as I once did.” 

~Esteban Schimpf

Artist Bio

@esteban_schimpf

Esteban Schimpf (b. Bogotá, Colombia, 1986) is an artist whose work exists at the intersection of image-making, performance, and sculpture. Born in Bogotá, Colombia, he lives and works between Los Angeles, Bogotá, and Mexico City. Schimpf received his degree from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. His large-scale works resemble classical sculptures, figures that appear carved from marble, wax, or bronze, existing at a threshold between serenity and unraveling. The works first register as sculptural objects, their surfaces convincingly mimicking the weight and tactility of physical matter. Yet, the longer one looks, the more this assumption fractures: what seems tangible is, in fact, an image.

Schimpf’s work has been featured internationally in exhibitions such as Icarus and Other Mythologies, SKETCH, Bogotá (2016) FBI, Arturo Bandini, Los Angeles (2015), Fruits and Plains, Visual Artist Group, Los Angeles (2015), UNTITLED, curated by Omar López-Chahoud: Present Co., Miami (2014), Get On The Pool, La Piscina, Los Angeles (2015) California Dreaming, curated by Fred Hoffmann at Portugal Arte 10, Lisbon (2010), Thanks For the Mammaries, ForYourArt, Los Angeles (2014), I Danced For You, Hanson Stern, New York (2012), Hang In There, curated by Jason Lazurus, Chicago (2011), Billboard Project, curated by Lauri Firstenberg and LA><ART, Lisbon (2010), The Contemporary Art Workshop in Chicago, and Bad Moon at Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Chicago (2008). In addition to Instant LA Summer 2: HEAVY HAPPY, he curated its prequel, Instant LA Summer 1, at Carmichael Gallery, Los Angeles (2010).