Beatriz Cortez

Beatriz Cortez

BornNationalityBased In
1970SalvadoranLos Angeles
Biography

Beatriz Cortez is an artist who creates sculptures and large-scale public installations that focus on themes of migration, movement, and cultural exchange. Drawing inspiration from her own experience of immigrating to the United States from El Salvador, she incorporates indigenous elements such as plants and stones from the Americas into her sculptures to highlight the parallels between the migration of people and plants. In her public installations, she includes weather and other atmospheric conditions to encourage viewers to consider the vast time spans marked by the planet's movements, the presence of non-human worlds with different timeframes all around us, and the ways in which materials are affected by their location and interactions with the environment. Her most popular work, Tzolk’in (2018), is a large-scale mechanical sculpture that incorporates elements of Mayan cosmology and technology. The machine is inspired by the ancient Maya calendar that was used for agriculture, and its gears move in a way that combines circular and linear motion. Her work imagines a new kind of space that brings together different histories and cultures, acknowledging global and cosmic nomadism and envisioning the potential for divergent entities to coexist. ...

Selected Artworks
Who do you believe more, the subversives or the embassy? (W. Washington blvd and Hoover St., LA, CA, USA)
Beatriz Cortez
Who do you believe more, the subversives or the embassy? (W. Washington blvd and Hoover St., LA, CA, USA), 2021
253 x 116 x 19cm
The Breathing Stone
Beatriz Cortez
The Breathing Stone, 2021
60 x 61 x 75cm
The Underworld
Beatriz Cortez
The Underworld, 2021
168 x 168 x 23cm
Roots 4
Beatriz Cortez
Roots 4, 2020
112 x 64 x 48cm
Roots 5
Beatriz Cortez
Roots 5, 2020
155 x 59.69 x 54cm
Roots 6
Beatriz Cortez
Roots 6, 2021
155 x 36 x 46cm
Roots 7
Beatriz Cortez
Roots 7, 2021
154 x 52 x 37cm
Roots 8
Beatriz Cortez
Roots 8, 2021
74 x 35.566 x 18cm
FOREVER YOUNG
Beatriz Cortez
FOREVER YOUNG, 2021
94 x 94 x 94cm
2 x 2
Beatriz Cortez
2 x 2, 2019
61 x 61 x 61cm
UNTITLED (from .bury.me.fiercely.)
Beatriz Cortez
UNTITLED (from .bury.me.fiercely.), 2021
66 x 53 x 4cm
Hidden
Beatriz Cortez
Hidden, 2017
29 x 37 x 4cm
I expected something (dedicated to A.C.)
Beatriz Cortez
I expected something (dedicated to A.C.), 2017
29 x 37 x 4cm
Roots 1
Beatriz Cortez
Roots 1, 2020
71 x 81 x 61cm
Roots 2
Beatriz Cortez
Roots 2, 2020
78 x 51 x 48cm
Tombstone/Lápida
Beatriz Cortez
Tombstone/Lápida, 2020
85 x 55 x 4cm
Five Point Hood Shield (light blue)
Beatriz Cortez
Five Point Hood Shield (light blue), 2019
62 x 66 x 7cm
Fifteen Point Shield 1
Beatriz Cortez
Fifteen Point Shield 1, 2019
61 x 66 x 8cm
Nine Point Custom Made Shield
Beatriz Cortez
Nine Point Custom Made Shield, 2016
76 x 84 x 20cm
The Argonaut: after Pakal
Beatriz Cortez
The Argonaut: after Pakal, 2018
318 x 127 x 153cm
Biennals
Whitney Biennial2017 - New York City
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