Jo Baer 1929, Seattle, US. Lives and works in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Jo Baer was one of the key artists of the Minimalist painting movement in New York in the 1960s and the first half of the 70s. It was during this period that she executed her series of squares in varying sizes, as well as vertical and horizontal rectangles in the hard-edge style, pieces that she would later expand into split arrangements like diptychs and triptychs. Her most recent solo exhibitions include Jo Baer: Gemälde und Zeichnungen seit 1960 (Drawings and Paintings) (2013) at the Museum Ludwig in Cologne, Germany, and In the Land of the Giants (2013) at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
Johanna Calle 1965, Bogotá, Colombia. Lives and works in Bogotá. Johanna Calle studied art at the Universidad de los Andes in Bogotá and at Chelsea College of Art in London, UK. Her recent solo shows include Foto‑gramática (2013) at Galerie Krinzinger in Vienna, Austria; Intertexts (2012) at Galeria Marilia Razuk in São Paulo, Brazil; Irregular Hexagon (2012) at San Arte in Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam; Submergentes: A Drawing Approach on Masculinities (2011) at MoLAA in Long Beach, US; Signos (2011) at Casas Riegner Gallery in Bogotá, Colombia and Zona Maco Sur (2010) in Mexico City, Mexico. She has also participated in group shows including SITELines: Unsettled Landscapes (2014) in New Mexico, US; Lines (2014) at Hauser and Wirth in Zürich, Switzerland; the 19th Bienal de Arte Paiz (2014) in Guatemala City, Guatemala; Marking Language (2013) at the Drawing Room, London, UK; the 12th Istanbul
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Biennial (2011) in Turkey; and the 7th Bienal do Mercosul (2009) in Porto Alegre, Brazil.
Jonas Staal 1981, Zwolle, the Netherlands. Lives and works in Rotterdam, the Netherlands. Jonas Staal investigates the relationship between art, democracy and propaganda. He is the founder of the artistic and political organisation New World Summit, which develops parliaments for stateless organisations banned from democratic discourse, and the New World Academy (with BAK, basis voor actuele kunst, in Utrecht, the Netherlands), which invites stateless organisations to research with artists and students the role of art in political struggle. Staal’s long-term research into the instrumental role of art in contemporary politics resulted, amongst others, in the free mobile phone application Ideological Guide to the Venice Biennale (2013) and his book and installation Nosso Lar, Brasília (2014), in which he explores the relationship between Spiritism and Modernism in Brazilian architecture.
Juan Carlos Romero 1931, Avellaneda, Argentina. Lives and works in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Throughout his career, Juan Carlos Romero has been part of groups dedicated to visual experiences and public interventions. He has won several awards, including the Gran Premio de Honor de Grabado del LXIII Salón Nacional de Artes Plásticas in Buenos Aires, Argentina; the United Nations Award (with Grupo de los Trece) in Yugoslavia; and the 1st Joan Brossa Visual Poetry Award in Spain. His most recent solo shows are Yo Acuso (2013) at the Museo de la Memoria in La Plata,
Argentina; Paradoja (2013) at the Museo Haroldo Conti in Buenos Aires, Argentina; and Violencia (2011‑2012), at the Morsbroich Museum in Cologne, Germany and the Fondation Cartier in Paris, France. Among his group exhibitions, highlights include the 7th Bienal do Mercosul (2009) in Porto Alegre, Brazil; the 4th Ljubljana International Biennial of Graphic Arts (2001) in Slovenia; and the 7th Bienal de La Habana (2001) in Cuba.
Juan Downey 1940, Santiago, Chile – 1993, New York, US. Juan Downey travelled through Latin America on several occasions in search of ‘an invisible architecture’ formed by channels of communication between a variety of groups. Seeing himself as a ‘cultural communicator and activating aesthetic anthropologist’, he sought to deconstruct the centralising vision of the world established by Western culture. His work has been part of exhibitions at the Guggenheim Museum (2014) in New York, US; Museo Rufino Tamayo (2013) in Mexico City, Mexico; Haus der Kulturen der Welt (2010) in Berlin, Germany; Sala Telefónica (2010) in Santiago, Chile, and the IVAM (1997) in Valencia, Spain.
Juan Pérez Agirregoikoa 1963, Donostia‑San Sebastián, Spain. Lives and works in Paris, France. Juan Pérez Agirregoikoa’s work is concerned with the ability of visual and written language to challenge those who come into contact with it, questioning what types of subjects we are, or allow ourselves to be. His drawings, tapestries and films have been shown in exhibitions such as Culture Is What Is Done to Us (2014), Clages