From September 13 to October 20, 2024, the MUDEC in Milan presents, with Deutsche Bank and in collaboration with 24 ORE Cultura, the exhibition Guaymallén by the Argentine artist La Chola Poblete, who won the prestigious international award "Artist of the Year" in 2023, dedicated to contemporary art by the Bank, now in its twelfth edition.

The exhibition is curated by Britta Färber, Global Head of Art & Culture at Deutsche Bank.

Artist, performer, and LGBTQ+ rights activist, in her work La Chola Poblete (1989) uses different media - sculpture, painting, performance, drawing, photography, video art - to explore themes such as the ramifications of the Inquisition, the legacy of colonization, and the pervasive influence of global capitalism.

The exhibition project Guaymallén pays homage to the indigenous origins and queer identity of the artist: taking its name from her hometown in northwestern Argentina, at the foot of the Andes, the exhibition merges the life, experience, and vision of La Chola Poblete into a deeply personal and candid narrative, rich in beauty, cruelty, and rebellion.

Guaymallén is an extraordinary "church of design," a sacred space populated by religious, political, erotic, pop-cultural, and indigenous motifs and symbols that overlap, dismantling hierarchies and established orders. An immersive environment that tells stories of salvation, virgins, martyrs, and ancient goddesses through a series of large watercolors, photographic works, and installations.

With this exhibition, La Chola Poblete confronts the historical role of women, transvestites, and transsexuals, expressions of femininity that have been targeted or marginalized by religious and patriarchal power structures. This is accompanied by a broader reflection that embraces the artist's position in the art world in relation to her identity (trans, indigenous) and the role of Western institutions in determining the canons of what we call "art," a process that is not just a historical product but actively depends on certain ideological and post-colonial conditions.