Cecilia Vicuña talks to Ben Luke about her influences—from writers to musicians, and, of course, other artists—and the cultural experiences that have shaped her life and work. Born in 1948 in Santiago, Chile, Vicuña is both a poet and a visual artist and intertwines these two artforms to produce work across a range of media. Among much else, she has a singular narrative painting style, makes huge suspended installations using found materials and textiles, stages performances and makes ephemeral sculptures. From the start, she has been deeply embedded in politics and social concerns, including human rights abuses in Chile, conflicts in different parts of the world, Indigenous culture and colonialism, and the climate catastrophe. Her work is underpinned by a profound engagement with different forms of Indigenous language allied to a response to prominent developments in Modern and contemporary art, from Surrealism to Postminimalism and Conceptualism. She discusses the symbiosis of word and image in her work, the wordplay that underpins some of her key concepts and strands of work, and how art-making is a full-body experience. She reflects on her early fascination with pre-Renaissance painting, the influence of her aunt, the artist Rosa Vicuña, on her experience of pre-Columbian art and languages, her admiration of Doris Salcedo, and the visceral shock of seeing medieval sheela na gig sculptures in Ireland. Plus, she gives insight into studio life and daily rituals and answers our ultimate question: what is art for?
Cecilia Vicuña: Living Threads, Whitechapel Gallery, 7 October-14 February 2027; Cecilia Vicuña: Quipu of Encounters: The Dream of Water, Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, 15 November–6 June 2027.
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