Carta abierta al Dr. Atl
Mario García Torres
Open Letter to Dr. Atl
Through his conceptual production, Mario García Torres’s work questions the artistic practice itself, employing modern and contemporary art history as a resource to establish a relationship between past, present, and future.
Following the strategy of imaginary correspondence employed in several of his works, García Torres mixes real and fictitious elements. In this case, the artist writes an imaginary letter to the painter Gerardo Murillo, known as Dr. Atl. The background of the piece shows Barranca de Oblatos, a canyon in Guadalajara that recurs in Atl’s paintings.
In the audio, however, he tells the dead painter about a plan to build a franchise of the Guggenheim Museum in this space. In his missive, García Torres addresses the connections between tourism, the market, the landscape, and art—and how art can disrupt a territory charged with cultural meaning.
MARIO GARCÍA TORRES (1975)
Carta abierta al Dr. Atl, 2005
Open Letter to Dr. Atl
Color Super 8 film transferred to DVD, silent
5’ 40”
Acquisition, 2007
