Alexander Apóstol. Regime: Dramatis Personae

Alexander Apóstol (b. 1969, Barquisimeto, Venezuela; lives in Madrid) is an artist known for his photographs, videos and installations in which he explores the entanglement of art and systems of political power, as well as how they mirror and distort each other. For most of his career, the artist has focused onLatin American geometric abstraction as a case study to interrogate the ideological foundations of modernism. The work on view in this gallery, Regime: Dramatis Personae (2018), is a series of black-and-white portraits depicting archetypal figures appearing on the stage of populist and authoritarian governments. Drawing on years of research into Venezuela’s turbulent political history, Apóstol analyzed the gestures, postures, and body language associated with characters operating within a political comedy of errors. The resulting portraits are not representations of specific individuals, but rather of the social, political and cultural roles produced and performed under autocratic regimes. The photos comprising this project were taken in Caracas at the height of the violent political repression that swept Venezuela in 2017. The artist collaborated with trans and LGBTQ+ activists, who modeled characters of their choice from the artist’s proposed dramatis personae. From the ninety photographs that comprise the entire series, Apóstol often selects and reorganizes the sequence, attending current events and the country and city where they are displayed. For his MOCA presentation he limited the selection to thirty-four portraits, including: The Dictator; The Masked Police Officer Who Acts with Impunity; The Ideological Tourist; The Trusted Public Official, Dismissed and Persecuted; and The One from Hollywood, among others.

Alexander Apóstol. Regime: Dramatis Personae is organized by José Luis Blondet, Senior Curator, with Emilia Nicholson-Fajardo, Curatorial Assistant, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles.