​

Marcos Castro’s practice is marked by the Mexican graphic and muralist tradition. Neo-Expressionism, German Expressionism, and contemporary Gothic aesthetic have also influenced his work. His work is a story that unfolds day after day, constantly under construction. Therefore each painting, drawing, and sculpture is also a fragment, an episode within the same universe.

 

The House of Vans CDMX main mural serves as the centerpiece of this exhibition. The work acts as a trigger for the curatorial proposal uniting, on the one hand, the artist’s constant search in the Mexican pictorial tradition, especially muralism, and, on the other, his obsession with the imaginary of what we understand by “Mexican.”

 

In this selection of works, there is a kind of satirization of the concept of death. The gloominess charge is blurred, and the characters are placed in ludic contexts, an invitation to get away from seriousness. There is a character who, like the skulls, is recurrent in Castro’s work: the Coacuitle. She is an entity that embodies the feminine, the Mexican, the brutal, and the monstrous. Using these mythologies, the artist questions the idea of official history. The history taught to us and the one we use to structure our critical thinking.

​

Valley of Shadows is an exhibition composed of works made in their entirety during these two years of the pandemic. It plays with the concept of darkness, highlighting the bright side that this supposed lack of light has. We want the viewer to approach this valley not from fear but by questioning the relationship that each one has with their own and historical darkness –of which we are part–, of deconstructing and rebuilding ourselves.

 

​