Mundos Alternos: Art and Science Fiction in the Americas

UCR ARTSblock presents Mundos Alternos: Art and Science Fiction in the Americas in fall 2017. A wide-ranging survey exhibition, it brings together contemporary artists from across the Americas who have tapped into science fiction’s capacity to imagine new realities, both utopian and dystopian. Science fiction offers a unique artistic landscape in which to explore the colonial enterprise that shaped the Americas and to present alternative perspectives speculating on the past and the future. In the works featured in the exhibition, most created in the last two decades, artists employ the imagery of science fiction to suggest diverse modes of existence and represent “alienating” ways of being in the world. Mundos Alternos brings into dialogue the work of international artists from across Latin America with Latino artists from throughout the US. Drawing on UCR’s strong faculty and collections in science fiction, ARTSblock offers a groundbreaking account of the intersections among science fiction, techno-culture, and the visual arts.

Mundos Alternos: Art and Science Fiction in the Americas is curated by Tyler Stallings, interim Executive Director of ARTSblock; Joanna Szupinska-Myers, CMP Curator of Exhibitions; and Robb Hernández, Assistant Professor, UCR Department of English. Kathryn Poindexter, CMP Curatorial Assistant, is Project Coordinator. This project is made possible with support from the Getty Foundation. Additional support is provided by UCR’s College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences (CHASS) and the City of Riverside.

Mundos Alternos: Art and Science Fiction in the Americas is part of Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA, a far-reaching and ambitious exploration of Latin American and Latino art in dialogue with Los Angeles, taking place from September 2017 through January 2018 at more than 60 cultural institutions from Santa Barbara to San Diego, and from Los Angeles to Palm Springs. Pacific Standard Time is an initiative of the Getty. The presenting sponsor is Bank of America.