XIMENA GARRIDO-LECCA

Garrido-Lecca’s work has been shown at major institutions including the 34th Bienal de São Paulo (2020), Portikus, Frankfurt (2022), the Renaissance Society, Chicago (2025), and the 2025 Sharjah Biennial, and in 2025 was acquired by the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York, as part of the museum’s Latin American Circle programme. She lives and works between Mexico City and Lima.

Early life and Education of Ximena Garrido-Lecca

Ximena Garrido-Lecca was born in Lima, Peru, in 1980. She studied fine arts at the Catholic University of Peru (Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú) from 1997 to 2001 before relocating to London.

In London, Garrido-Lecca completed a postgraduate course at the Byam Shaw School of Art in 2002, followed by a Master of Fine Arts at Byam Shaw School of Art at Central Saint Martins in 2004. After a decade based between London and Lima, she moved to Mexico City, where she continues to live and work alongside maintaining a presence in Lima.

Ximena Garrido-Lecca Artworks and Style

Ximena Garrido-Lecca creates sculptures, installations, and multimedia works that explore the tensions between Peru’s ancestral knowledge systems and the impacts of colonial and globalised modernity.

Early works and developments, 2000s—2010s

Garrido-Lecca’s early works, shown at venues including the Saatchi Gallery, London (Newspeak: British Art Now, 2010), and Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art (2012), established her engagement with Peruvian material culture as a lens for examining extraction, labour, and landscape. Works such as her Los Suelos series (2013—2014) involved miniature replicas of ancient mud walls overlaid with commercial signage, referencing the erosion of indigenous practices. Her selection for the Future Generation Art Prize in 2014 at the Pinchuk Art Centre, Kyiv, brought international recognition.

Mature practice and key series, 2010s—2020s

Through the mid-2010s and 2020s, Garrido-Lecca deepened her investigation of botanical, geological, and textile systems. Solo exhibitions at MALBA, Buenos Aires (Estados Nativos, 2017), SAPS, Mexico City (Insurgencias botánicas, 2017), and Orange County Museum of Art (Spectrums of Reference, 2019) saw her working with copper weaving, hand-thrown ceramics cracked with iron solder and LED tubes, and living plant specimens. Her inclusion in the 34th Bienal de São Paulo (2020) and the 5th Kochi-Muziris Biennale (2022) cemented her international profile.

Recent projects and ongoing themes, 2022—

Garrido-Lecca’s recent work extends her research into solar technologies, pre-Columbian ritual vessels, and agricultural processes. Her Heliomorphism series, shown at Museo Madre, Naples (2021), uses silicon from solar panels to replicate archaeological vessels from the Temple of the Sun at Pachacamac, connecting ancestral sun worship with contemporary energy extraction. In 2025, she presented Germinations at the Renaissance Society, Chicago, and participated in the Sharjah Biennial 16. That same year, her work was named winner of the Bass Museum of Art public art commission in Miami Beach.

Public Commissions by Ximena Garrido-Lecca

• 2025 — Modulations, Sequence XXIX, Bass Museum of Art public art commission, Miami Beach

Awards and honours of Ximena Garrido-Lecca

• 2025 — Acquisition, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (Latin American Circle)
• 2025 — Bass Museum of Art Public Art Commission, Miami Beach
• 2016 — FLAAC Residency, Genk, Belgium
• 2016 — 30th Ateliers Internationaux Residency, Frac des Pays de la Loire, Carquefou
• 2014 — Future Generation Art Prize nominee, Pinchuk Art Centre, Kyiv
• 2012 — LARA — Latin American Roaming Art, Asiaciti Trust

Exhibitions of Ximena Garrido-Lecca

Ximena Garrido-Lecca has exhibited widely at institutions, biennales, and contemporary art galleries across the Americas, Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.

Select solo exhibitions

• 2025 — Germinations, The Renaissance Society, University of Chicago
• 2025 — Demarcaciones Inversas, Kasmin at Meridiano, Puerto Escondido, Mexico
• 2024 — Galeria Vermelho, São Paulo
• 2023 — Reverse Engineering, CAN Centre d’art Neuchâtel
• 2022 — Inflorescence, Portikus, Frankfurt
• 2020 — 34th Bienal de São Paulo
• 2019 — Spectrums of Reference, Orange County Museum of Art, Santa Ana
• 2017 — Estados Nativos, MALBA, Buenos Aires

Select group exhibitions

• 2025 — Sharjah Biennial 16, Sharjah, UAE
• 2024 — Crossings, Kasmin, New York
• 2022 — 5th Kochi-Muziris Biennale, India
• 2021 — Rethinking Nature, Museo Madre, Naples
• 2021 — Normal Exceptions: Contemporary Art in Mexico, Museo Jumex, Mexico City
• 2015 — United States of Latin America, Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit
• 2014 — Future Generation Art Prize, Pinchuk Art Centre, Kyiv
• 2010 — Newspeak: British Art Now, Saatchi Gallery, London

Collections

Ximena Garrido-Lecca’s work is held in the following public and private collections:

• Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York (acquired 2025)
• Tate Modern, London
• Boros Collection, Berlin
• MALBA, Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires
• Kadist Foundation, Paris/San Francisco
• Staatsgalerie Stuttgart
• Museo de Arte de Lima
• Frac des Pays de la Loire, Carquefou
• MIMA, Middlesbrough Institute of Modern Art

Website, Instagram, and further reading

Ximena Garrido-Lecca is represented by Galerie Gisela Capitain, Cologne; Kasmin, New York; and 80m2 Livia Benavides, Lima. View artworks, exhibitions, and further reading about Ximena Garrido-Lecca on Ocula.

About this profile

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Ocula | 2026