The Print Center is pleased to partner with the Manhattan Graphics Center (MGC) to present an artist talk with Miguel A. Aragón, joined by Ksenia Nouril, our Jensen Bryan Curator, and Sarah Kirk Hanley, MGC’s Executive Director.

Aragón will talk about his career and themes related to his ongoing work, which was exhibited in Miguel A. Aragón: Indices of Silence/Índices del silencio (January 17 – March 13, 2020) at The Print Center.

Miguel A. Aragón (born Ciudad Juárez, México; lives Staten Island, NY) is a printmaker whose work explores memory, perception and loss in relation to the mass murders, arrests and corruption associated with the war on drugs in and beyond his hometown.

Working in a sophisticated array of media and techniques on paper, from physical alteration of photocopies to wood burned-embossing, puncturing and chemical alteration, Aragón’s process ties directly to his concept and subject matter. He alters and distorts enlarged photographs of victims using forceful reductive processes that evoke loss and pain. Aragón’s charred, poked, drilled and erased images directly correlate to the damage the ongoing violence has burned into the collective Mexican memory.

Aragón has a BFA from the University of Texas, El Paso and an MFA from the University of Texas, Austin. He is Assistant Professor in Printmaking, College of Staten Island, City University of New York. He has exhibited extensively nationally and internationally in solo and group exhibitions, and has received numerous awards, prizes and residencies. His work has been included in several surveys of contemporary printmaking and is held in private and public collections, such as the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; National Museum of Mexican Art, Chicago; and Minneapolis Institute of Art.

Watch the Talk: