Spanning two decades of corrupt political regimes and economic deterioration in Peru, Ann Kaneko’s AGAINST THE GRAIN: AN ARTIST’S SURVIVAL GUIDE TO PERÚ unravels the tangled web of displacement and oppression that agitate Peruvian citizens. Kaneko focuses on those who fight for the freedom of expression and the artists who put those expressions into motion in the public sphere.

“Is freedom of expression a right or a privilege?” Four visual artists raise this question in their struggle to shift the tides of political unrest in their homeland into an opportunity for change.

Claudio Jiménez Quispe flees his home in Ayacucho, where he’s caught in the crossfire of the Maoist guerrilla organization, the Shining Path, and the Peruvian government. As a folk artist, he uses the template of retablos, a traditional expression of faith, to chronicle the bloody civil war that gave rise to radical opposition.

An active member of the underground punk scene in the 1980s, Alfredo Márquez works with the art of mechanical reproduction. His layers of bold colors and visual cues resonate with the present climate of discontent and probe the possibilities of the future.

Bombarded with images of riots and violence tearing through the country, Eduardo Tokeshi feels alienated from his country. His nationality is complicated as a son of a Japanese immigrant, with jeering critics aligning him with the controversial former President Alberto Fujimori. His works, informed by his observations and personal experiences are a series of interpretive Peruvian flags.

Natalia Iguíñiz explores the subversive potential of the self-portrait and, in revealing the body in it’s restricted and silenced state, she opens up a provocative and often contentious dialogue on gender, race, and class with the Catholic Church and socially conservative middle class.

Kaneko’s portraits point to the role of the artist in society and the opportunity to find creative solutions to foster change.

Ann Kaneko will be in attendance.

See also: Documentary Subjects, Female Gaze