Photo Fringe 2020

Photo Fringe OPEN20 SOLO winner Studio Lenca (the working name of artist Jose Campos) in conversation with Patricio Majano, curator and leader of Y.ES Contemporary, El Savador

In an international open call to emerging photographers, Photo Fringe invited online proposals responding to the question: “How can photography make a difference?”

You can enjoy the resulting interactive digital exhibition, El Cipitio, on our festival website, or discover how to participate in Studio Lenca's project yourself.

Studio Lenca is the working name of artist Jose Campos - “Studio” referring to a space for experimentation and constantly shifting place; “Lenca” referring to ancestors from El Salvador. Born in La Paz, Jose lives and works in London. Having first trained in contemporary dance, Jose received an MA in Arts & Learning from Goldsmiths University of London in 2019.

“I've never walked into a gallery and seen anyone that looks like me.” says Jose, “Los Historiantes is about asking a question about the absence from our curriculum, which artists are missing from museums and galleries and why? How can we allow colonisation to continue to erase cultures? The exhibition is a starting point for making new work collectively to imagine a more equal future.”

Los Historiantes is Studio Lenca’s ongoing photographic performance work, creating self-portraits dressed as a Historiante - an El Salvadoran folk dancer mixing traditions brought over by Iberian conquistadors during the colonisation of the Americas with Pre-Columbian beliefs. These dancers are to Studio Lenca an embodiment of an archive of trauma with contemporary resonance.

Patricio Majano is a Salvadoran curator, artist and professor. He is the Curator and Interim Director of Y.ES Contemporary and a professor at the School of Arts of the University of El Salvador. Previously, he collaborated in the Educational Programs of the Museum of Art of El Salvador and the Forma Museum in San Salvador. He earned his BA from the University of El Salvador. His practice focuses in Salvadoran context and environment.