Opening: Saturday, June 1 from 2pm to 8pm. Artist-led tour at 3pm.

La Nueva Fábrica is pleased to announce Ru Raxal qa Rayb’äl (The Green of Our Desire), Edgar Calel’s first institutional solo exhibition in Guatemala. The project is curated by Edgar Calel and Ilaria Conti, La Nueva Fábrica’s Executive Director, in close collaboration with the Calel family and La Nueva Fábrica’s (LNF) team.

Edgar Calel anchors his work in the Mayan Kaqchikel worldviews that stem from family and community life in his hometown of Chi Xot (San Juan Comalapa). His practice honors and upholds the spiritual, physical, and emotional nourishment and communal knowledge that his land, family, and ancestors bestow upon him. His subtle and at times humorous practice works through strategies that are conceptual and sensorial at once.

Ru Raxal qa Rayb’äl (The Green of Our Desire) responds to La Nueva Fábrica’s 2024-2025 exhibition cycle through a series of living and ever-changing installations that bring into proximity diverse notions and practices of healing. The resulting project stands as an offering created by Calel to welcome LNF’s publics into a space of contemplation and sentipensar (sensing-thinking) that activates multiple forms of sense-making.

The artworks and installations presented stem from, in the artist’s words, “Practices that were never forgotten by the communities in our territories. These practices never ceased to exist and continue to be at the center of life.” The resulting artworks are invitations to pursue forms of intimate, communal, and societal healing.

The title of the exhibition refers to the desire to “return” to a natural environment that is a source of knowledge, spirituality, nourishment, and protection, despite the plundering of land, water, and landscape that has been constitutive of 500 years of colonial dynamics in Guatemala and beyond.

Ru Raxal qa Rayb’äl offers a path of interconnected moments of contemplation and intimacy that are relational in nature. The exhibition does not seek to create a mere representation of spirituality to be consumed through the act of looking, but rather invites publics to come into proximity with forms of communal care based on reciprocity.

Please join us on Saturday, June 1, 2024 from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m. for the opening of Ru Raxal qa Rayb’äl. At 3 p.m. Edgar Calel will lead a visit of the exhibition.

On that day, two free buses will be available:

From Guatemala City: the bus will depart at 12:00 p.m. from Guatemala City from the Parking on Vía 6 3-55 zona 4, in front of the Da Vinci University, where you can also park your vehicle. The bus will depart at 7:00 p.m. from La Nueva Fábrica to return to Guatemala City. Capacity is limited to 30 passengers. To reserve your spot click here.

From San Juan Comalapa: the bus will depart at 12:00 p.m. from San Juan Comalapa’s Central Park and depart at 7:00 p.m. from La Nueva Fábrica to return to Comalapa. Capacity is limited to 30 passengers. To reserve your spot click here.

Image: Edgar Calel, Como luciérnagas son cada uno de mis pasos XXX (Each One of My Steps are Like Fireflies XXX), 2024. [Detail]. Photography by Margo Porres. Courtesy of the artist and Proyectos Ultravioleta, Guatemala City.