Willy Castellanos
Joined Meer in October 2019
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Willy Castellanos

Willy Castellanos is an art historian, curator, and artist, who graduated from the University of Havana with a pioneering research on the reappearance of nudes in Cuban photography (1982-1993) after two decades of absence. His writings have been published in magazines and newspapers such as Arte al Día International, Art Nexus, El Nuevo Herald, The Sun Sentinel, Revolución y Cultura, and Nagary Magazine, as well as in several exhibition catalogs in Miami. Guillermo "Willy" Castellanos is co-author of the book Raúl Cañibano, published by the la Colección Fotobolsillo of La Fábrica in Madrid, and is author of the introductory essay of Unofficial, a title published by Kendall Art Center Editorial, Miami.

Castellanos is the co-founder -along with Adriana Herrera, PhD- of Aluna Art Foundation and Aluna Curatorial Collective. Since its creation in 2011, the collective has designed significant curatorial projects. They have opened spaces for a non-hegemonic dialogue on the relationship between art and society, both in the headquarters of the foundation in Miami and in different galleries, museums, and institutions in Lisbon, Siberia, Monaco, Moscow, Houston, and Lima.

A self-taught photographer, Castellanos is the co-author of two artists’ books: El Deseo en el Pavo Real (Historia de una academia de Tango) with writer, composer, and playwright Alberto Munoz (Buenos Aires, 2000); and Obras: 1996-2000 (Group of Authors), both publications of the Secretary of Culture of the City of Buenos Aires. He has participated in several group exhibitions such as Dobleplay: fotografía cubana contemporánea (Photo Museum Cuatro Caminos, Nahualcan, México, 2017); La banalidad del mar: fotografía cubana (Museo de Arte Moderno, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, 2016); Re/Formulations: Narrative Processes (William V. Musto Museum, Union City, New Jersey, 2015); and Rites of Passage: Selection of Cuban Contemporary Photography (Photo Lima, Peru, 2015) among others.

His solo project Exodus: A Missing Page in History, was selected in 2012, as the Anchor Project for the inauguration of the pavilion PhotoAmericas, at ArteAmericas Miami. Then, his photographic exhibition Exodus: Alternate Documents, held at the Centro Cultural Español de Miami, received the Miami Foundation Arts Award for Best Cultural Event in Miami in 2014.

The members of the Aluna Curatorial Collective have curated, among others, the flowing exhibitions: Women Weavers: The Warp of Memory (SaludArte Foundation, Miami, 2018); Sonia Falcone: Campos da vida (Palácio Nacional da Ajuda, Lisboa, Portugal, 2017); The Object and the Image; This is Not a Chair Either (Concrete Projects/Doral Contemporary Art Museum, Miami, 2017); Ronald Morán. Inmaterial Dialogues (Centro Cultural Español de Miami, 2017); Jorge Eduardo Eielson: The Other Side of Languages (Kabe Contemporary Gallery, Miami, 2016); Arte-Factum/Fictions. Viviana Zargón (Aluna Art Foundation, Miami, 2015); A Russian, a Chinese, and a Cuban walk into an Art Show (Aluna Art Foundation, Miami, 2015); Parrhesiastes: The Cutting Edge of Truth. 26 Graphic Communicators on Censorship and Freedom of Thought (Aluna Art Foundation, Miami, 2015); Photo Album: Families in Miami. Lorna Otero (The Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum, Miami, 2015); Affective Architectures (Aluna Art Foundation, Miami, 2014-2015); Exodus: Alternate Documents (Centro Cultural Español de Miami, 2014); Seminal Art: We are All Co-creators (Siberian Museum of Contemporary Art, Novosibirsk, Western Siberia, 2013); Damien Hirst and Sonia Falcone (General Society Private Banking of Monaco, Mónaco, 2013); Vanished Points and Convergences. Salvadorian Artists in Perspective (Biscayne Art House, Miami, 2013); and Body, Maps and Territories: Personal Geographies (Aluna Art Foundation, Miami, 2012).

Articles by Willy Castellanos

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