Author Description

Nicolás Guagnini: Theatre of the Self is a hybrid catalogue-reader based on the exhibition of the multi-threaded performances of Buenos Aires-born New York-based Guagnini. Many of these works, spanning from 2005 until 2019, have never been seen before or have not been seen since their original live presentation. Raised in Argentina during the "Dirty War" and violent military dictatorship, Guagnini moved to New York in the late 1990s and co-founded the film production company Union Gaucha Productions with Karin Schneider in 1997. In 2005 Guagnini became co-founder of Orchard Gallery, an artist cooperative based on the Lower East Side. The work in Theatre of the Self is informed in part by autobiography, history, politics and through Guagnini's community itself. Some performances were participatory, some were not. But all were made polyvocaly in collaboration with a group of artists with shared interests and concerns around performance and the moving image including Ei Arakawa, Leigh Ledare, Jeff Preiss, Aura Rosenberg, Karin Schneider among others.This publication invites internationally acclaimed art historians, curators and artists to think about the material in Guagnini's work within a unique format. Readers of the publication will be interested in contemporary art, film, political science, performance studies, and Latin American studies.