Zona Maco 2024: 5 Works You Won’t Want to Miss

Kristy M Chan's Cardigan Factory (2023) at The Artist Room

Kristy M Chan's paintings immerse you in a torrent of unrestrained emotion. On her canvases, a mixture of joy, anxiety, excitement, and rage battle it out through rapid, layered brushstrokes and deep segments of colour beside calmer, washed-out hues.

Showing with The Artist Room, the London-based artist brings five new oil paintings that focus on the intense labour of art-making. Guided by her emotion and intuition, each painting boasts a different palette, setting a variety of moods.

Describing her new works, Chan said they are 'like a deep exhale of labour and mortality'. Feeling down to earth, rooted and human when painting them, she explains, 'I felt how my body is tired, and which particular muscle was aching from painting in a certain position with every movement.'

In an interview with Ocula Advisory in 2022, Chan discussed her painting process, asserting, 'For me, it's absolute chaos. When I begin to make a painting, I have a lot of energy that sways between stress and excitement.'

Chan will have her first solo exhibition with Tabula Rasa Gallery in Beijing later this year.

Alicja Kwade's Trans-for-Men 7 (2023) at Pace Gallery

After parting with her longtime dealer, Johann König, last autumn, Polish artist Alicja Kwade joined blue-chip Pace Gallery, who bring her sculptural work to Mexico City.

Trans-for-Men 7 (2023) explores how things are built through natural processes. The sculpture comprises a series of the same rock, which Kwade 3D-scanned to make seven variations. When looking from one end to the other, these rocks undergo a transformation—evolving from smooth, naturally coloured, and textured objects, to hard-edged, man-made products.

Separated by glass panels, these rocks look like an exhibit from a natural history museum. Did Kwade bring us here to study and observe them? Or is she trying to document our relationship with nature and how we transform it?

Kwade's presentation at the fair coincides with Beyond Behind, her two-person exhibition with Gregor Hildebrandt at Museo de Arte de Zapopan in Guadalajara, on view until 7 April 2024.

Arturo Kameya's Terreno en litigio (2024) at GRIMM

Since seeing Arturo Kameya's exhibition at GRIMM in New York last year, Ocula Advisors have been keeping tabs on the Peruvian artist.

Using a palette of subtle greens and blues, Kameya depicts ordinary moments imbued with magic and nostalgia. His paintings, recounting memories of his upbringing and exploring the socio-political nuances of his motherland, are like faded, forgotten photographs.

Speaking to Ocula Advisory about his practice in 2023, Kameya remarked, 'most of the images are drawn from real events, whether they are personal, public or a combination of both. I tend to make works based on events that could have been recorded or documented, even if they are considered so "unimportant" that they lack visual records.'

For Zona Maco, GRIMM brings a joint presentation of work by Kameya and Claudia Martínez Garay. Kameya's new paintings and installations look at the Peruvian media and the manufacturing of fake news and political smokescreens.

Terreno en litigio (2024) is a prime example of the artist's ghostly style. The acrylic and clay powder painting depicts a Gravitron amusement park ride, its occupants scrambling to hold on, painted in layers of washed-out spearmint.

Sections of the work look weathered as if the paint has gradually worn away, revealing layers of older, darker paint. This appearance of muted paint layers is commonly found on housing in Peru's rural regions and is reminiscent of the house Kameya grew up in.

Sebastian Silva's Animals don't have feelings (2021) at OMR

'I paint what I want to see.' Though this phrase is attributed to Philip Guston, it defines Sebastian Silva's approach to painting.

Born in Chile, Silva paints cartoonish forms inspired by his childhood fascination with animation. He intends to bring cartoons to life by taking them from television to canvas.

Silva's paintings, often featuring fragments of dog paws or rabbit ears, have an unsettling charm. Once bright and playful, these images have morphed into weathered, worn and half-drawn beings.

Animals don't have feelings (2021)—a painting of cartoon bears, dogs, and rabbits melting into one another—retains an abstract style. Through patches of colour, exaggerated shapes, and textured layers, Silva conjures a scene with childlike energy.

Known for his filmmaking, Silva had his first solo exhibition of paintings in 2021 with OMR in the gallery's Bodega space. For the fair, the Mexican gallery present two of his paintings alongside works by Claudia Comte and Artur Lescher, among others.

José Yaque's Lepidolita con Impurezas II (2022) at Galleria Continua

Cuban artist José Yaque explores the nuances of colour in his large-scale abstract paintings.

Drawing inspiration from the geological realm, Yaque studies the surfaces of various rocks and minerals, reimagining them through a psychedelic palette.

In Lepidolita con Impurezas II (2022), titled after the lilac-hued mineral lepidolite, Yaque replicates the texture of its interior. Electric blue, blush pink, orange, and yellow bleed into one another. The fluid pattern is reminiscent of satellite views capturing Earth's meandering rivers.

Yaque's exploration of pigment, shade, depth, and movement is a joy to see and effectively conveys his deep affinity with the beauty of the natural world.

Galleria Continua presents Yaque's painting alongside works by Julio Le Parc, Daniel Buren, Anish Kapoor, and Ai Weiwei, among others.