43

Three months before Scott McCarney and his partner visited Oaxaca Mexico in December 2014, 43 students from a teacher’s college in the state of Guerreo were kidnapped and presumed murdered. The palpability of that event was evident in the pictures he made that year and in a following trip in January 2016. The story of the 43 continues to unfold in tandem with the USA’s struggle with distrust between police and citizens of color.

McCarney will be working on a book based on images from Oaxaca to communicate these constructed tragedies of corruption and learn from the cultural response of those directly affected. Oaxacan street art and Edwardo Sarabia’s work utilizing iconography from the narco trade in decorating traditional Puebla tin-glazed earthenware are influential. The physicality of the book structure will be grounded in referencing craft traditions of Oaxacan villages (i.e. weaving, alebrije [wood carvings], and paper picado [cut paper commemorations]).

Scott McCarney is an artist/educator in Rochester NY whose art practice has been in book form since 1980 and spans many media, from offset and digital printing to sculpture and site-specific installation. His works are exhibited internationally and can be found in collections of MoMA NY and V&A, London, among others.

Wednesday May 3, 6pm

Join us for an open studio and artist talk about the progress of 43.