Adela Goldbard

Adela Goldbard is an interdisciplinary artist and educator from Mexico City. She holds an MFA as a Full Merit Fellow in Sculpture from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) and a bachelor’s degree in Hispanic Language and Literature from the National University of Mexico (UNAM). She is currently a member of the National System of Artistic Creators of Mexico. With her work, Goldbard investigates how radical community performances can subvert the imposition of official narratives and how performances of violence and destruction can become aesthetic tools of resistance against power. She is especially interested in how collectively building, staging, and destroying has the potential to generate critical thinking and social transformation, and can help heal collective trauma. Goldbard’s practice draws on archival and field research, and brings together sculpture, video, photography, sound, text and traditional textiles, pottery, woodwork, and pyrotechnics. Her recent projects include: a pyrotechnic play for/with the Mexican community of La Villita in Chicago, commissioned by Gallery 400 (University of Illinois, Chicago, 2019-2020,) and a socially engaged art project for/with the P’urhépecha community of Arantepacua, commissioned by the XIV FEMSA Biennial (Michoacán, México, 2020).