Kcho
KCHO, born Alexis Leiva Machado on the Isle of Pines, is a contemporary Cuban artist. He first attracted international attention by winning the grand prize at South Korea's Gwangju Biennale in 1995.
Biography
Early years
Alexis Leiva Machado was born in Nueva Gerona, Isla de la Juventud, on February 12, 1970. Son of Ignacio de Loyola Leiva Abreu, a carpenter and telecommunication technician, and Martina Primitiva Machado Cuní, better known as Martha Camacho, a famous artist, he grew up alongside four other sisters. He attended Josué País primary school, Manuel Alcolea primary school, and subsequently, Elementary Art School Leonardo Liberta in Isla de la Juventud. In 1986, he enrolled in the National School of Plastic Arts in Havana and graduated in 1990, specializing in painting and sculpture.In 1986, at sixteen, he marked the start of his career with the personal exhibition "Kcho Expone Favelas" at the Centre of Plastic Arts in Nueva Gerona. From 1990 onwards, he began to display his works in individual and collective exhibitions both nationally and internationally. One of his works from his graduation thesis Paisaje Popular Cubano, 1990, homonymously named, allowed him to be part of the permanent collection displayed at the Fine Arts Museum of Cuba.
1990s
In 1991, KCHO made his first personal exhibition at the MNBA for the "Artist of the Month" space, which around that time received exhibitions from great exponents of Cuban plastic arts. That same year he was awarded the Prize granted by the National Group of Art Schools' Teachers at the Centre of Plastic Arts and Design of Havana, Cuba. Also in 1991, he was part of the exhibition Proyectos Recientes with the sculptors Alejandro Aguilera, Ángel Ricardo Ríos, and Osvaldo Yero, among others, at the Arts Centre 23 y 12 in Havana.He took part in the travelling show Los Hijos de Guillermo Tell by curator Gerardo Mosquera, which was displayed at the Museum Alejandro Otero in Caracas, Venezuela and the Library Luis Ángel Arango in Bogotá Colombia. It gathered artists like José Bedía, Glexis Novoa, and other important representatives of the 80's generation –Kcho being the youngest artist invited to the exhibition. This show was given a warm and favourable reception by both the public and the specialized critics, including the article written by Ivonne Pine that appeared in the second edition of the ArtNexus magazine under the same title as the exhibition.
1992, was significant for the arts in Cuba since it enhanced the view of strength and creativity held by the plastic arts in this country. It was marked by two crucial international collective exhibitions in which Kcho had the opportunity to display his work: Vont Dort Aus: Kuba, organized at the Forum Ludwig in Aachen, Germany, and Arte Cubano Actual coordinated by Robert Littman for the Cultural Centre of Contemporary Art from the Cultural Foundation Televisa in Mexico City. He took part as well in critical international projects such as the First Biennial Barro de América by curator and critic Roberto Guevara at the Museum of Contemporary Art Sofía Imber in Caracas, Venezuela, where he shared exhibition spaces with Ana Mendieta, Rimel Cardillo, Milton Becerra and other essential artists in the region. Other favourable occasions to broaden the perspective of Cuban art, and Kcho's view, in particular, was the collective exhibitions La Década Prodigiosa, which grouped a selection of Cuban plastic arts from the eighties at the Museo Universitario del Chopo in Mexico City, and La Ronda Cubana at the Van Reekum Museum in Apeldoorn, Holland.
In 1993, Kcho fulfilled an extensive agenda of national and international commitments exhibiting his works in Cuba, the United States, Mexico, and Holland, among other countries.
In 1994, he won a scholarship to the Ludwig Foundation for art studies in Aachen, Germany, and he also got invitations to three critical events in the art circuit. The first one came from curator Nelson Aguilar to participate in the 22nd Biennial in São Paulo, Brazil; the second one from Dan Cameron to be part of the collective exhibition Cocido y Crudo organized at the Museum Reina Sofia in Madrid; and the third invitation came from Yiliam Yanes Godoy, curator and director of the first and significant Biennials of Havana, to become part of the exhibition La Otra Orilla during the Fifth Biennial of Havana held at the colonial fortress Castillo de Los Tres Reyes del Morro –in this last event, he displayed his work La Regata which from that very same year belongs to the collection of the Ludwig Museum in Cologne, Germany. La Regata appears on the cover of Revolución y Cultura magazine and in Artnews, June 2000.
In 1995, he participated in the 1st Kwang-Ju Biennial, Korea, where his work won the Grand Prix. That same year, in Paris, France, he was awarded the Prize for the Promotion of Arts granted by UNESCO due to the magnitude and scope of his work, for which Prize an international jury must select from hundreds of applicants worldwide. The award was presented by the then Director of UNESCO, Federico Mayor Zaragoza.
Also in 1995, he made three personal exhibitions: Kcho at the Pilar I Joan Miró Foundation in Majorca, Spain; El Camino de la nostalgia at Centre Wifredo Lam in Havana; and Tabla de salvación at the Espacio Abierto Gallery, also in Havana, Cuba. In these three shows, the artist reinforces his interest in the subject of travels and migrations with simple but categorical installations such as El Camino de la nostalgia and Lo Mejor del Verano –the latter being also displayed at the exhibition Cocido y Crudo organized by the Museum Reina Sofía in Spain.
Kcho represented Cuba in critical collective exhibitions like Arte nuevo de Cuba at the Whitechapel Art Gallery in London, Great Britain, by curator Katherine Lampert; Campo by curator Francesco Bonami, for the opening of the Sandretto-Re Rebaudengo Foundation for the Arts, in Turin, Italy – this show was also displayed at the exhibition halls of the same Foundation in Venice, Italy; Nuestro Siglo at the Ludwig Museum in Cologne, Germany; Diálogos de Paz at the United Nations Headquarters, Geneva, Switzerland; La Habana – São Paulo – which grouped a sample of biennials from Cuba and Brazil, at the Centre for Cultures of the World, in Berlin, Germany; at the 1st Biennial of Johannesburg, South Africa; and at the 4th International Biennial of Istanbul, Turkey. By the end of the year 1995, Kcho had met Barbara Gladstone, owner of the Barbara Gladstone Gallery in New York, in Havana, with whom he organized two significant exhibitions that helped develop a greater awareness of his work in the United States and the rest of the world.
In 1996, during the first of these shows, which were named Kcho, the Museum of Modern Art in New York acquired his work Columna Infinita # 1, which along with the previously received drawing A Los Ojos de la history, 1995, represent him at the permanent collection of this museum. Kcho became the artist who reopened MOMA's doors to Cuban art, being, after Wifredo Lam, the first to be part of such a unique collection.
File:Kcho - Coluna Infinita 1.JPG|thumb|left|Coluna infinita. Sculpture by Kcho at the Brazilian Museum of Sculpture, São Paulo.
In 1996, the Cuban artist displayed his work at the Studio Guenzani in Italy and extended an invitation to the young Italian artist Giuseppe Gabellone. He also showed the exhibition Para olvidar at the International Center of Contemporary Art in Montreal, Canada.
The same year, Kcho's work went to Europe as part of the exhibition about the history of Cuban art: Cuba Siglo XX. Modernidad y sincretismo. It travelled from the Centro Atlántico de Arte Moderno in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain, through La Caixa, Palma de Mallorca, Spain; the Centre d'Arte Santa Mónica, Barcelona; and the Kunsthalle Bielefeld in Germany.
The installation Obras escogidas appeared on the cover of Flash Art magazine, May/June issue, 1996. After being invited by curator Jan Hoet, Kcho visits Belgium to participate in the show De Rode Poort at the Museum van Hedendaagse Kunst in Ghent. He also takes part in the exhibition Arte a través de Los océanos at Container 96 in Copenhagen.
1997 was a year with plenty of work and personal and collective exhibitions. At that time, he had the opportunity to work with Chief Curator Paul Schimmel and Assistant Curator, Alma Ruiz, to organize his intimate show Todo cambia for the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, California. KCHO could not go to the opening himself because the government of the United States refused his entry visa.
Yet this ban on setting foot on American soil stopped neither this exhibition at MOCA nor the private show: Kcho, Proyectos recientes at the Regen Projects Gallery in Los Angeles, nor the collective exhibitions No Place Like Home at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis by curator Richard Flood and TRUCE: Ecos del Arte en la Edad de las conclusiones infinitas, by curator Francesco Bonami, in Santa Fe, United States.
Other noteworthy exhibitions in 1997 were his show "Speaking of the Obvious Was Never a Pleasure for Us" at the Israel Museum, Billy Rose Pavilion, in Jerusalem, and the collective exhibitions: Utopian Territories, New Art from Cuba at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, University of British Columbia and at the Contemporary Art Gallery, both in Vancouver, Canada; Trash at the Museo d'Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto, Italy; Así está la Cosa: instalación y arte objeto en América Latina, an international exhibition of modern art organized at the Cultural Centre of Contemporary Art in Mexico; and the 6th Biennial of Havana, that took place at the colonial fortress San Carlos de La Cabaña, for which he created the exhibit Archipiélago de mi pensamiento from the series Columna infinita –currently this piece belongs to a private collection in Italy.
In 1998, just as in previous years, Kcho took part in the most important art exhibitions and biennials all over the world, such as Arco in Madrid; Dark Art in Senegal; the 3rd Biennial Barro de América and the Feria Iberoamericana de Arte in Venezuela; Cada día, 11th Biennial in Sydney, Australia; and Expoarte in Guadalajara, Mexico. His work is in the following collective shows: Visión global del nuevo Arte de Los Noventa in Deste Foundation in Athens, Greece, and +Zone, at Palazzo Re Rebaudengo in Guarene d'Alba, Italy.
This same year the most outstanding personal exhibitions were Archipiélago de mi pensamiento, Serie Americana, I Kcho, at the Galerie Nationale du Jeu De Paume, Paris, France, by curator Daniel Abadie; and Largo Viaje, opened at the GAN Gallery in Tokyo, Japan.
Later, in 1999, Kcho was admitted into the Atelier Calder Residence in Saché, France, after receiving the prize granted by the Calder Foundation and the Ministry of Culture of France. This award made it possible for him to live and work at the Calder studio with a subvention for producing and promoting artworks among the essential art circuits in Europe. Kcho ended his stay in France with the personal exhibition Klder. C.C.C in Tours and with the inclusion of the piece Para olvidar el miedo in the historic collective exhibition – which attempted to sum up the sculpture in the 20th century - Los Campos de la escultura, located at the Elysian Fields in Paris.
In 1999, his work travelled with curator Francesco Bonami to the United States for a two-artist exhibition: Encuentros: Kcho and Nauman, at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago.