Born in Spain, Varo (María de los Remedios Alicia y Rodriga Varo y Uranga) fled Europe in 1941 due to the growing dangers of World War II and emigrated permanently to Mexico City, where she worked amid a community of Mexican and European artists who drew inspiration from the culture and geography of Mexico. It was here that Varo developed her unique practice of juxtaposing Surrealist chance-based techniques with imagery from disciplines as wide-ranging as chivalric romance, ecology, geographic explorations, feminist critique, mysticism, psychology, and tarot.
Remedios Varo: Science Fictions—the first museum exhibition dedicated to the artist in the United States since 2000—brings together more than 20 paintings Varo created in Mexico from 1955 until her death in 1963. Additional materials from the artist’s archive—large-scale cartoons for paintings, notebooks, sketches, detailed studies, ephemera, and personal possessions—offer an even deeper understanding of her distinct and diverse practice. The exhibition’s subtitle, Science Fictions, alludes to the tensions and possibilities Varo brought together in her work as she searched to visualize hidden orders and unseen truths.
july 29, 2023
