“I see the work of memory as a work in the present tense. Historical events, no matter how atrocious, remain buried behind our eyes unless they are spoken about, unless they are constantly re-articulated and re-told. I see my role as an artist in that respect as kind of stirrer of other people’s memories to produce current stories, discourses that may instruct to us about the (political) faults of the past.”

1. BIOGRAPHY

Carlos Motta’s multi-disciplinary art practice documents the social conditions and political struggles of sexual, gender, and ethnic minority communities in order to challenge dominant and normative discourses through visibility and self-representation. As a historian of untold narratives and an archivist of repressed histories, Motta is committed to in-depth research on the struggles of post-colonial subjects and societies. His work manifests in a variety of mediums including video, installation, sculpture, drawing, web-based projects, performance, and symposia.

His work was the subject of survey exhibitions at MACBA, Barcelona (2025); MAMBO, Bogota (2023); Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus (2022); Museo de Arte Moderno de Medellín (2017); Matucana 100, Santiago (2018); and Röda Sten Konsthall, Gotheburg, Sweden (2015). His solo exhibitions at international museums also include PICA, Portland (2020); Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam (2017); PAMM, Miami (2016); MALBA, Buenos Aires (2016); PinchukArtCentre, Kiev (2015); Tate Modern, London (2013); Sala de Arte Público Siqueiros, Mexico City (2013); New Museum, New York (2012); MoMA/PS1, New York (2009); and Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia (2008), among others.

Motta’s work was included in collective international shows such as the 60th Venice Biennale (2024); the 58th Carnegie International, USA (2022); the 11th Berlin Biennale (2020); the 32nd Bienal de São Paulo (2016); the Göteborg Biennial of Contemporary Art (2015); the 10th Gwangju Biennale (2014); the 2nd Moscow International Biennale for Young Art (2010); and the Lyon Biennale (2010).

He also participated to numerous collective exhibitions in international institutions such as the ICA Los Angeles (2024); San Jose Museum of Art (2024); MoMA, New York (2023); Wellcome Collection, London (2023); Kunsthalle Wien (2021); Metropolotian Museum of Art, New York (2020); SF MoMA (2019); ICA Boston (2019); Migros Museum, Zurich (2015, 2019); Witte de With, Rotterdam (2018); SCAD, Savannah (2018); MASP, Sao Paulo (2017); LACE, Los Angeles (2017); MALI, Lima (2017); CAC Vilnius (2016); MUMA, Melbourne (2016); HKW, Berlin (2015); Getty Museum, Los Angeles (2015); Jeu de Paume, Paris (2014); and Guggenheim Museum, New York (2011), among many others. His films have been screened at the Film at Licoln Center, New York (2021); Rotterdam Film Festival (2010, 2016); Toronto International Film Festival (2013); and Internationale Kurzfilmtage Winterthur (2016).

Carlos Motta has been awarded the Artist Impact Initiative x Creative Time R&D Fellowship (2023); the Vilcek Foundation’s Prize for Creative Promise (2017); the PinchukArtCentre’s Future Generation Art Prize (2014); and a Guggenheim Fellowship (2008).

A comprehensive monograph of his work, Carlos Motta: History’s Backrooms, was published by SKIRA in 2020. His work is featured in Phaidon’s 2023 anthology of Latin American Artists.