Artist Statement:
Originally from El Salvador, my body of work is an intuitive construction of memory as a form of personal myth-making that casts political expressions, voices modes of resistance, and most recently speaks to a process of recovery, re-growth and healing.
My areas of research and art production are concerned with issues of collective memory, historical trauma and identity explored through multi-disciplinary approaches to drawing, that involve traditional printmaking techniques, stop-motion animation video and installation work. My body of work brings a confluence of motifs found in pre-Hispanic mythology, Salvadoran popular folklore, Roman Catholic iconography with styles sourced from Western art history to merge a hybridized aesthetic of historical, cultural and personal experience.
In addition, my ongoing body of research focuses on the impact and legacy of the Salvadoran civil war in the 1980s, a time my family and I witnessed and as a result of which, immigrated to Canada. Consequently, my studio process is a constant act of revision of inter-generational knowledge rooted in individual stories and collective histories, issues of migration and the subject of violence filtered through the possibilities of personal narration. As a Salvadoran, and Latin American artist, my research also investigates the cultural intersections between local indigenous storytelling and syncretic practices with political ideas of resurgence, decolonization and memory construction.
Areas of interest and study complementary to my research activities and practice include Latin American Art and history, art and social movements, contemporary art and culture, folklorism, and American Indigenous knowledge systems.
As a Salvadoran visual artist and educator I’ve lived and worked in the ancestral unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and Sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations, known as Vancouver for 9 years.
BIO:
Osvaldo Ramirez Castillo (b. 1978, El Salvador) immigrated to Canada at age 11. He is a graduate of The Ontario College of Art and Design (2001) and obtained his MFA degree at Concordia University in 2008. He has exhibited extensively across Canada and internationally in venues such as The International Print Centre in New York, The Southern Alberta Art Gallery, MAI (Montréal Arts interculturels), The Mexic-Arte museum in Austin, Texas, MARTE- Museo de Arte Moderno in EL Salvador and La Halle Saint Pierre in Paris among others.
He is the recipient of The Artist Studio Award Program by the City of Vancouver (2015-2018), including the Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant (2010) and numerous others from The Canada Arts Council. He was shortlisted for the Pierre- Ayot Prize in 2009 for an emerging artist by the City of Montréal. In 2011 Castillo was the winner of the Victor-Martyn Lynch-Staunton Award for a mid-career artist in visual arts in Canada. He has participated in international residency programs at Headlands Center for the Arts, USA. Kala Art Institute, Berkeley, California; Proyecto 'ACE in Buenos Aires, Argentina; and The Santa Fe Art Institute (Immigration & Emigration residency in 2016, and Truth & Reconciliation residency in 2019), New Mexico. USA.
Available Artworks :
'Ruinas'Mixed media drawing on Mylar
10 x 13.5 inches
‘Sin título’
Mixed media drawing on Mylar
9.5 x 13.5 inches
'Guerrillera Monument'
Mixed media drawing on Mylar
12.5 x 17 inches
'Reruin'Mixed media drawing on Mylar
15 x 11.5 inches
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