El Universal
The installation incorporates pages from El Universal, a prominent conservative Mexican newspaper that serves as a conduit for local and global news, covering subjects such as politics, culture, and the financial sector. These pages are affixed to the wall and defaced with black aerosol paint to reveal a negative image effect beneath the newspaper’s ink, creating a layered critique of the media’s role in shaping public discourse.
Accompanying the wall installation is an artist’s book, which features scanned images of flyers collected from public spaces—predominantly phone booths in Mexico City—advertising informal and often ambiguous job opportunities. These flyers, in their raw and transient form, encapsulate the precariousness of labor in the informal economy. The arrangement of these images follows a color gradient, resembling a Pantone chart: a seamless transition from black to warm tones and cooler shades, and back to black. This progression mirrors the cyclical nature of labor, economy, and the shifting hues of human experience within systems of work that remain both essential and exploitative.
1/8
Year: 2013
Medium: Spray paint on newspaper, printed matter
Dimensions: Variable
Installation: Hessel Museum of Art, New York.
