Lugar de Consuelo (Place of Solace)

Featuring a dazzling array of prints, drawings, costumes, sculpture, video, and a performance, Naufus Ramírez-Figueroa’s Lugar de Consuelo (Place of Solace) (2020) addresses the political and personal histories of Guatemala’s long civil war (1960–96). Building on Ramírez-Figueroa’s research on Latin American theater, Lugar de Consuelo is inspired by the history of the revolutionary play El Corazón del espantapájaros (Heart of the Scarecrow), written by the playwright Hugo Carrillo in 1962. During the civil war, Guatemala’s government violently repressed a student production of the play. Years later, Ramírez-Figueroa learned about this from his uncle, who participated in that production as an actor. The artist’s research, drawn mostly from oral accounts, resulted in etchings, drawings, and costumes that reimagine the events surrounding its censorship.