Rigo 23

Rigo 23, Through the Glassworks, Earth’s Oldest Satellite, Me and You, Some in the Fewture 1990 – 2017, commissioned by the Creative Foundation for Folkestone Triennial 2017. Image by Thierry Bal.

Rigo 23
Through the Glassworks
Earth’s Oldest Satellite
Me and You, Some in the Fewture 1990 – 2017

Through the Glassworks is an invitation and inspiration to students at The Glassworks Sixth Form Centre to make their mark on Folkestone’s cultural landscape: the painted billboards (initially carrying the title double edge) leave space for student self-expression. Earth’s Oldest Satellite reminds us that earth’s closest neighbour may as often be beneath our feet as above our heads. The graphic paper Me and You, Some in the Fewture, rooted in 90s Los Angeles confessional comic genre, chronicles two visits to the United Kingdom (Lewisham and Folkestone) twenty-five years apart. From a youthful Punk to an older young parent; from an enamored UK tunneling itself into Europe, to a UK on the edge of divorce proceedings.

Rigo 23 is known for publicly placed artworks that encourage viewers to examine their relationships to their communities - specific in terms of site and culture - often in collaboration with others and over extended periods of time. Collective memory and markers of time are central concerns within his broad focus of world politics and the respectful telling of truth to power. So, in California he has been involved with supporting the narratives both of the Black community and of marginalised Indigenous communities.

He has had solo exhibitions at the Fowler Museum (2014); Times Museum, Guandong, China, (2013); REDCAT, Los Angeles, USA (2012); New Museum, NYC, USA (2009); Museu de Arte Contemporânea, Niteroi, Brazil (2007); Centro Das Artes, Madeira Island, Portugal (2006);
IT Park Gallery, Taipei, Taiwan (2001); and is currently preparing an exhibition for the Main Museum in Los Angeles in 2018.

Recent group exhibitions include 12th Sharjah Biennial, United Arab Emirates (2015); 5th Auckland Triennial, New Zealand (2013); 2nd Aichi Triennale, Japan (2013); 1st Kochi-Muziris Biennale, India (2012); 3rd Shenzhen/Hong-Kong Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism and Architecture, China (2009); 10th Lyon Biennale, France (2009); 4th Liverpool Biennial, United Kingdom (2006).

Rigo 23 (born Ricardo Gouveia in Madeira, Portugal), has lived and worked in California, USA, since the 1980s.

Further reading:

5 Questions (for Contemporary Practice) with Rigo 23

Review: At REDCAT, Rigo 23's art collaboration with Zapatistas

Human, Soul & Machine: The Coming Singularity!