A conversation with Miguel Keerveld on their latest exhibition ZÓCALO (Mexico – Suriname).
Miguel Keerveld is a Curator – Artist from Suriname. ZÓCALO, Keerveld’s latest solo exhibition came to a close earlier this year at the Readytex Art Gallery, downtown Paramaribo, following a well attended 2 month showing from 07 November 2024 to 04 January 2025.
In a conference introduction to the exhibition, Curator Francisco Guevara (Co-Founder, one of the Executive Directors of the Arquetopia Foundation, Mexico) entitled his presentation on ZÓCALO: “Our practice as a meeting point.”
Historically speaking, el zócalo or the zócalo was the original term used to designate public space in Mexico; a site that would be later colonised by Spanish conquistadors as the central plaza or translated into English, a main square.
Beyond the spatial designation of the zócalo however, in his presentation, Guevara the Exhibition’s Curator highlighted the collective significance of the zócalo as a space for communal archive, memory, existence and survival “… the point of coming together; a space of collective gathering; a site for tactical manoeuvering, laughter, joy, celebration. A site for protests and acknowledgement of an Other.”
And indeed, in Keerveld’s most recent artistic and curatorial undertaking, the Artist-Curator extended a highly personal invitation to 22 artists, to meet him at his “home”, the Readytex Art Gallery in Paramaribo, Suriname. The result would be a group-solo exhibition incorporating the voices and creative output of artists who Keerveld has met and admired during the course of his travels throughout Latin America, the Caribbean, the world. A convening, a zócalo, intentionally orchestrated by Keerveld – with sensitivity, care, generosity and joy.
I reflect on the way in which Keerveld has reimagined the “individual” “solo” space as an inclusionary one, open, circular, non linear and atemporal. Cosmic. Global. Interacting and inter-reacting.
At the same time, Keerveld’s way of working has made me think about the way we are never ever making, creating, thinking in isolation. There is always cause – effect. Action – reaction. We are perpetually responding to, answering the call of the stimulus / stimuli around us. As observers, interpreters and performers of – and with – the real, Artists I believe are most receptive and aware of this osmotic process of creation.
There is no me, without you.
ZÓCALO is the place where we gather, where we find and meet each other.
INTERVIEW
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All things are in a relationship. It is the Indigenous framework of things.
Judith Le Blanc, Native Organizers Alliance
AG: Dear Miguel, the exhibition text refers to the exhibition ZÓCALO as the culmination of 20 years of creative labour. Would you say that this production has been in the making for this period of time?
MK: The exhibition has been in the making for approximately two years. This reflective space and time is a dialogue with my artistic practice of 20 years and follows as a playful contribution to explorations of the Alakondre concept that I was invited to join, while contributing to its potential. Led by Alida Neslo, this model is devised in collaboration with ReadyTex Art Gallery, their core and guest artists. When I entered this domain in 2021, to explore social mediation at the intersection of art and healing as my way of curating within and outside art systems, I wanted to add value to the context of Suriname based on my experience in exploring the Latin American and Caribbean context. Therefore, I devised ZÓCALO as an exhibition that shares my political views, with experiences in art as psychotherapeutic space-time.
Entrance view of exhibition ZÓCALO, at Readytex Art Gallery Paramaribo, January2025
Photo credit: Adriana Korbee
AG: Could you share about your process in selecting these artists & their works?
MK: In this collective space, besides inviting 22 artists to gather for a discourse or dialogue, I also wanted to honor five artists. The event became a public conversation that creates joy for us in a largely polarizing world. In fact, all artists contributed with one artwork, whether it was a single piece, a triptych, or other type of series.
My own contribution is a set of seven installations. For the selection, I consulted my performance persona ‘tumpi flow’ who guided me through this long-term process. I started off by recognizing those whose legacy paved the way for my own artistic endeavors; namely, the late Erwin de Vries, his late wife Lilian Abegg-de Vries, Rinaldo Klas, Alida Neslo and Adriana Korbee.
Installation of ALAKONDRE Blue | 55 Azulejos by Miguel Keerveld.
Mixed media double sided painted canvas, varying dimensions (2020)
Furthermore, I have been lucky to find like-minded people – as artists I admired and learned from along the way- who I have encountered in Suriname and abroad. I reached out to some of them (whose artistic work and voice fit the politics that bring me joy) with the invitation to symbolically gather at my home in Paramaribo, at the Readytex Art Gallery so that we could unpack a quest too difficult to simply put into words. With their artistic qualities, they contributed to a process that worked very well.
Installation of Masks by Miguel Keerveld and Erwin de Vries, combined with Indigenous African
and Native American masks from Miguel’s collection. Mixed media, varying dimensions.
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There is no individuality without collectivity.
Francisco Guevara, Curator of ZÓCALO
AG: I’m interested in hearing more about the format of the exhibition you have chosen: ZÓCALO is presented simultaneously as a solo exhibition AND a group exhibition.
How did this idea/decision come about?
MK: The curator of this exhibition, Francisco Guevara, once told me in a mentoring session: “there is no leadership without citizenship.” As he perfectly framed a fascination/frustration I have been struggling with over time in almost all manifestations of my existence and practices (whether as artistic producing, coaching/counselling, or managing), this knowledge triggered me deeply to acknowledge that there is no individuality without collectivity. A tension I needed to explore sooner or later. So, I decided to face it now, since it resonates with my own individual situation – I recently transitioned into another context (Brazil) which I believe makes acknowledging a network of peers even more urgent, to provide a space to look beyond the current global politics and understand that it is rather a state of collective transitioning.
In my search for meaning in my practice as a contemporary artist, I understand my passion for curating as a sustainable and more relevant type of art production. Through a set of performances on and around the pedestal (or zócalo in Spanish) of a statue made by the artist Erwin de Vries, I could face fears and joys that came along with my ambitions. When I explained this to my mentor Francisco Guevara, he guided me along the multidimensional essence and political relevance of the zócalo as a space of gathering (while my performances on the pedestal were largely in solidarity).
In this way, Francisco challenged me to explore the public realm. His validation of my ideas and motives for my solo show to question the artist as individual author through a collective process became a source of real joy, exploring how to bridge our differences, making zócalo the ideal metaphorical subject and object for both: a pedestal to stage oneself (the individual aspect) and as a square for collective celebration (communal aspect).
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Thinking about space is thinking about relationships.
Francisco Guevara
Detail. Installation view of Zócalo by Miguel Keerveld (2024)
AG: Over time the term zócalo has taken on various meanings, the Central Plaza is one of them. Where did the desire to present an exhibition on the zócalo come about?
MK: The desire to enter in the dialogue I framed as ZÓCALO came from knowledge and my intuition. During seven years, I gathered ‘inspiration’ while exploring the context of the state of Puebla in Mexico as an economic center of power of the Hispanic Empire in the so-called “New World”. Alongside this violent process, that has been performed in many ways over centuries, Puebla has been significant throughout the history of colonization and within my process of investigation. Here, remains of coloniality are still visible in the many Catholic churches and universities for which Puebla is well known. Some of the churches, for example, are built on top of important pre-Columbian spiritual and political sites encountered by the colonizers when they arrived in what was then named the Americas.
Display of Mexican Ponchos depicting Moctezuma II and the Aztec calendar
(machine weaving, purchased at a tourist market in Puebla) Photo credit: Adriana Korbee
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History and Place are mapped experiences and therefore colonized existences.
Miguel Keerveld
Detail view of installation Why Is Our Womb Bleeding Blue? By Miguel Keerveld (2025)
AG: In our previous conversations, you’ve spoken about Mexico as a very special space for you. A place you’ve been returning to for many years. Can we talk about your relationship with Mexico and your own creative production?
MK: Mexico appeared in my search for peers and a community whom I felt understood by. In Mexico, I felt welcome to engage in present, past, and future through my creative dialogue; something I did not immediately sense when staging conceptual work in the context of Suriname. Not until most recently. Through my encounters in Mexico, I found a basis that supports my theoretical/conceptual needs – even though challenging. An experience that has allowed me to rearticulate my work and focus my ambitions to engage with altered realities.
In Suriname, I’ve been challenged as well, but not all the time. In general, I have been forced, for example, to move from focusing on “history and place” and rather explore “time and space” as not yet colonized. Both history and place are mapped experiences and therefore colonized existences which create limitations to the intensity I present in my work.
Through the experience/exploration of Puebla in Mexico, I have been able to understand how Modernity is a violent process tied to amongst others, Christianity, Capitalism and Democracy. All issues that, in my opinion, I see unfit for our reality in the Caribbean region. This is the crux of Mexico as important space-time in my practice: a point of departure, the zócalo (whether such as understood in the context of Mexico as a spiritual, political, military, and economic space to meet or such as it fascinates me in the context of Suriname as time for reflection). I look at Mexico as a complex entity… In the work that I focus on (both personal and collective care), Puebla is a relevant ‘institution’ to meditate with.
11 y 7 Puebla (2024) Etching, No. 2/20 by Roberto Rodriguez
AG: Were you able to notice a difference between your creative process in Mexico vs Suriname, in preparation for the Zócalo exhibition?
MK: The line between what my creative process looked like in Mexico vs Suriname is very thin. However, I think of both contexts as bringing me very specific forms of joy. Namely, in Mexico I have the privilege of exploring a more individual art production process while in Suriname I feel more like encountering a collective archive, making curation within the context of Suriname my primary focus. However, I have forbidden myself to distinguish art production from curating; not restricting myself in choosing one over the other. Mexico and Suriname are spaces of deep emotions and spirituality in my experience. Therefore, my focus is on a politics of connection.
Video projection on painting: Mukulu 1 by Luanda from performance series by tumpi flow ‘Why is our Womb bleeding blue?’
(2012-2024: Nieuw Amsterdam in Suriname and Puebla in Mexico)
AG: What are some recurring elements in the exhibition, which you intentionally chose?
MK: In the process that gave birth to ZÓCALO, I focused on a set of performances taking place over time and executed in different contexts with the intention of questioning the subject of modernity. For this process I used the question Why Is Our Womb Bleeding Blue?
Through these performances I have been exploring the long history of colonialism, imperial expansion, nationalism, and globalization in which the Empire uses power and violence to fix our bodies in history and place. Therefore, I used mechanisms beyond the body in this exploration and rather focused on play as experience, knowledge, and interconnection within communities that are rooted in the shared histories of extermination. By putting play at work, I was able to focus on grounding rituals that aim at the strength of re-imaginative processes.
Detail of installation entitled Zócalo by Miguel Keerveld (2024)
AG: Blue as a color is quite predominant in this exhibition, appearing in many of the works such as your installation Alakondre Blue | 55 Azulejos, Mukulu by Luanda and again as blue shards in the installation Zócalo. What were you seeking to engage about?
MK: Throughout history blue has been a ‘body’ of and for power in the appearance of Empire. Like gold, it consists of processes of extermination, in which we find the legacy-ies of colonialism. For example, in the production of indigo and lapis lazuli. Blue was specifically used in ceremonies of nobility and Catholic rituals and even restricted to be used outside of these power structures.
Understanding the complexities of modernity requires exploring this violence in the history of Blue. However, I also explored Blue as one of the most fluid essences in nature and culture; for example, in nature it appears mostly as a structural color rather than as pigment, and across many belief systems this color is used for protection against bad influences that can cause harm. I think of Blue as (my) mana, the shamanic essence (according to animist beliefs) that I sometimes silently engage with, and other times loudly encounter to become involved with something unknown.
Detail. Installation by Miguel Keerveld comprising masks, crosses and coffins (2025)
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The difference between the Americas and the rest of the world is our ability to convoke joy – even in the direst of moments.
Francisco Guevara
AG: Are there other questions/ thematics which were important for you to address in this exhibition?
MK: Not really… I would stick to my earlier mentions, ZÓCALO explores colonialism. More specifically, it explores how artistic performativity could act as a metamorphic process –a grounding space-time– that supports transformative aspects of encounters with the potential to strengthen collective capacities.
Fri Sranang (Angisa), selected by Xavier Robles de Medina. A silk screen ink on textile designed by his grandfather
(Stuart Robles de Medina) and printed for the Independence Day of Suriname in 1975.
I also see ZÓCALO as a personal ritual that closes a period of frustration. This is the celebration of my fascination with Blue. It follows a process informed in different creative experiments that I executed between 2012 and 2017 personally and then followed between 2012 and 2023 collectively. During both processes, I have used the pedestal of a statue of Alonso de Ojeda created by the late artist Erwin de Vries. Alonso de Ojeda was a Spanish explorer, governor, and conquistador, regarded as a ‘discoverer’ of modern-day Caribbean, whether that is correct or not. After a statue of him at Nieuw Amsterdam, Suriname, was stolen in 2011, I have been dialoguing with its base or zócalo (unconsciously at times and consciously in some settings); using this zócalo as a metaphor to transform its meaning while rethinking many issues of modernity and exploring this object beyond the subject of coloniality. In essence, I encounter the base of this statue as space to gather as reflective time.
Installation view of the painting Mukulu 1 (2023) by Luanda.
Photography credit: Adriana Korbee
Within the same space.
In Keerveld’s ZÓCALO, perspectives are shared on issues of the present day: enduring legacies of Empire and the colonial Machine, violence as a process, past-present-future reverberations while simultaneously facilitating conversations on collective healing, protection and the making of new meanings.
As I reflect on the motivations – personal, political, other – and aspirations which propelled this exhibition – I enjoyed seeing Keerveld’s awareness of impact and the (r)evolutionary imperative to decolonize, unearth and disrupt what we have learnt.
What in fact constitutes a solo exhibition?
At what point did achievement become associated with a solo endeavour?
Is there more “value” to the work produced by an Artist “alone”?
But actually how is this value determined?
I appreciated the way in which the structure of Keerveld’s ZÓCALO interrogates the SOLO show, to re-position the presence / influence / existence of the collective as the sine qua non of all creative production. Whether we readily admit or acknowledge this, is another matter.
On the concept of space and the spatial – the exhibition’s Curator Francisco Guevara sees the expanse of our human experience as occurring “Within the same space.” He further reiterates the all-encompassing, liberating nature of space itself, whereby all things exist in relationship. Guevara affirms: “It is possible for two bodies to occupy the same space, at the same time.”
Making, Creativity or Creation is therefore an inextricably connected, collective act, within the ever expanding, shared space of the zócalo.
It is here that Western narratives of power, control and domination – where the individual, alone reigns supreme – are rendered obsolete.
ZÓCALO.
It is here that we gather with agency and with the possibilities of re-imagining, re-claiming and re-investing our space-s. To evoke, convoke and conceive anew.
//.
Selected works from ZÓCALO
- Installation Alakondre Blue | 55 Azulejos by Miguel Keerveld
- Etching 11 x 7 Puebla, Mexican artist Roberto Rodriguez
- 3 Mexican Ponchos, used during performances Why Is Our Womb Bleeding Blue?
- Ceramic bowl with corn and other seeds (Installation Why Is Our Womb Bleeding Blue?, Miguel Keerveld)
- Assorted / various Masks on wall with coffins and crosses (Untitled, with ceramic masks by Miguel Keerveld, Erwin de Vries, and wooden masks from Miguel’s collection)
- Mukulu by Brazilian artist Luanda
- Installation Zócalo (with gold statue, rice, blue paintings, and leaves) by Miguel Keerveld in collaboration with Analis Valpus
Participating Artists in ZÓCALO
Alanis Vulpis, Alexis, Annemarie Daniël, Cornelius Tulloch, Dakaya Lenz, Dhiradj Ramsamoedj, Fabian de Randamie, Francisco García Villavicencio, Kit-Ling Tjon Pian Gi, Kurt Nahar, Luanda, Luiza Sandler, Neil Fortune, Neimad Flow, Richenel Para, Roberto Rodríguez, Ruben Cabenda, Shaundell Horton, Sri Irodikromo, Victoria Marques, Xavier Robles de Medina, and Yacine Fall.