June 30, 2012
Artist Reception 7-9pm
AFTA Party with DJ Later Knight 9-11pm
At Human Resources, 410 Cottage Home Street, 90012

Human Resources presents Divorcio USA, a night of recent work by Jacinto Astiazarán hosted by the curatorial collaborative AFTA (“Art For The Americas”) on Saturday June 30, 2012. The 7-9pm artist reception and screening will be followed by an AFTA party with libations, dancing and a north/south border mix by DJ Later Knight (We Break Cameras).

Mexico City-based artist Jacinto Astiazarán will screen two new video projects, which introduce his investigation into mutual responsibilities in cultural relations between Mexico and the U.S. While assimilation continues its progressive adaptation in both directions, these works highlight some of the mutations that can inevitably develop as part of this evolution. Though formally very different, the two videos fill in gaps for each other and create a platform to contemplate underlying problematics of exchange.

Lago Onega N.8 documents the final stages in construction of an apartment building by Mexico City developer Ana Bertha Damián. Based on her leisure travels in the U.S. and the formative impression they left on her, Ana condenses her image of Americanness into the phenomenological experience of an A-frame roof. Reflecting her dissatisfaction with the state of Mexico City’s architectural sequences, she implements this design feature as a crowning statement, to unique results.

DIVORCIO USA 2005/2012 presents an episode from the now canceled television program Divorcio USA, which aired in 2005 in the L.A. area on Canal 62, a local-access Spanish language broadcaster. The artist plays the defendant on this staged divorce court show, whose wife is requesting an annulment after she discovers he only married her for a green card. His background coincided with the character he portrayed in that they were both born in Tijuana and needed to resolve their immigration situation while living and working in Los Angeles. Their fate was not the same, but the artist presents this video documentation of a time in his life as an example of personal, participatory evidence into the issues that feed his work, turning the gaze on himself in a notoriously exploitative setting.

About the Artist

Jacinto Astiazarán, born in Tijuana in 1982, lived and worked in Los Angeles before moving to Mexico City in 2010. He has taken this experience as a starting point for considering questions of appropriation and transference in the relationship between the two countries. As with some of his previous collaborative projects, interests in performance for video and documentary formats continue to shape his work. He holds a B.A. from the School of Cinema-Television of the University of Southern California (2004) and has exhibited in galleries, museums and film festivals in Mexico, the U.S. and abroad.

About AFTA

AFTA (“Art for the Americas”) is the event-based curatorial collaboration of Kelly Coats and Kathleen Kim. The aim ofAFTA is to facilitate cross-border relations between artists throughout the Americas by reducing barriers to migration and providing a welcoming environment for artists to engage in cross-cultural exchange. AFTA advances this objective by hosting non US-based artists to present or perform their work at the Los Angeles art gallery and performance space Human Resources. The artist presentation is followed by an AFTA Party intended to welcome and celebrate the artist’s visit and cultivate cross-cultural exchange with other artists and art appreciators throughout the evening. The AFTA Party showcases performers and DJs whose work embodies cultural hybrids influenced by cross border dynamics.