About
I reclaim ‘imagination’ as the point of departure for my practice. Perhaps due to an apparent halo of naivety or escapism, the word has been deeply mistreated. Yet imagination is the muddy ground where the known and the infinite layers of the unknown coexist.
Unlike the synthetic minds manufactured in data centers, human imagination is an organic phenomenon that goes beyond a clever remix of experience. It is a vital tool for a life that refuses to be dictated by the boundaries of our certainties.
For two decades, I have collaborated with scientists and all sorts of curious minds. Through these dialogues and experiments, I have learned to become a committed wanderer, connecting the scattered dots of human knowledge.
This impulse drives me to traverse the distance between faraway planets and ceramics, animal sounds and human voices, a banal shoe and geological time. New worlds emerge within the gaps of our reality.
I am an Ecuadorian artist whose journey began far from the traditional artworld. I grew up as a self-taught artist, fully committed to a sense of curiosity that was fed by books, films, friendships, and (mostly) embracing failure and experimentation.
In those formative years, I co-founded the art collective Lalimpia (2002–2009), and began appreciating knowledge that comes from unexpected places.
In 2009, I received a scholarship to pursue an MFA in Sculpture at Virginia Commonwealth University in the US, graduating in 2011. After that, my work led me across borders and disciplines. In 2013, I was welcomed to The Netherlands as an artist-in-residence at the Jan van Eyck, a turning point that opened new doors, windows, and cracks. Since then, I’ve been part of programs such as Skowhegan (US), Delfina Foundation (UK), and many others.
Solo exhibitions of my work include Mácula at MUAC (Mexico City), Zaratán at Melly Kunstinstituut (Rotterdam), NON at Galería Livia Benavides (Lima), The Andean Information Age at Copperfield (London), A Heavy Halo at RADIUS Center for Art and Ecology (Delft), among others. And, group exhibitions displaying my work include institutions such as the Venice Biennale (IT), Guggenheim Bilbao (SP), Diriyah Biennale (KSA), LACMA (US), Yokohama Triennale (JP), FRAC Île-de-france (Paris), IMMA, Dublin (IE), Museum Voorlinden (NL), Humboldt Forum, Berlin (DE), SongEun Art Space, Seoul (KR), NRW FORUM Düsseldorf (DE), Museum of Modern Art, Warsaw (PL), among many others.
And, complementary to my artistic practice, as a believer in the importance of artistic education, I’m an advisor at De Ateliers, Amsterdam (NL), and have previously been a professor at Sint Joost, Breda (NL), a lecturer at UArts, Philadelphia (US), and a visiting professor at Espol, Guayaquil (EC).
Oscar Santillán, visual artist based in The Netherlands and Ecuador.
