Born in Catamarca, Argentina, Miguel Angel Rios now divides his time between Mexico City and New York. He received worldwide appreciation when he first showed his work A Morir (Till Death): a ground-breaking three-channel video of audacious ambition exploring colonialism and globalization by creating a darkly romantic narrative with spinning black and white tops—’trompos’.
Rios made several works in the series of spinning-top videos, in which he expresses his primary concerns of social power struggles, violence and geopolitics on an intriguing symbolic level. In his more recent films, Rios continues to compose powerful metaphors for violent subjects, combining control and coincidence to represent the uncertainty and temporariness of the human condition.
Miguel Angel Ríos (1943, Catamarca, Argentina) has had solo exhibitions at museums across the world, including Röda Sten Konsthall, Göteborg, SE (2019), Galería Barro, Buenos Aires, AR (2019), MUCEM, Marseilles, FR (2017), ASU Art Museum, Temple, USA (2015), Museum of Fine Arts Houston, USA (2013), Sala de Arte Público Siqueiros, Mexico City (2013), Des Moines Art Center, Iowa, USA (2012), Museo Carrillo Gil, México DF (2011), Museo de Arte Latinoamericano de Buenos Aires (2009), Maison Européenne de la Photographie MEP, Paris (2011 and 2009), Fries Museum, Leeuwarden (2008), and Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington (2005). His videos have been screened during La Biennale de Lyon, FR (2015), Liverpool Biennial, GB (2011), and the Biennale of Sydney, AU (2010).
Rios participated in group exhibitions at a.o. Suzanne Dellal Centre, Tel Aviv, IL (2021), Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York, USA (2021), UCCA Dune, Qinhuangdao, CN (2019), Galleria d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Bergamo, IT (2018), The Parkview Museum Singapore (2017-2018), Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, Auckland, NZ (2016), Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, DE (2015), Centro del Carmen, Valencia, ES (2014), New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, USA (2014), Musée d’Art Contemporain de Nîmes, FR (2013), Busan Museum, KR (2012), Tranen Contemporary Art Center, DK (2012), Molaa Museum of Latin American Art, USA (2011), The National Museum in Warsaw, PL (2010), and Daros Exhibitions, Zürich, CH (2009). He studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and has received numerous awards including the John Guggenheim Fellowship (1998) for his work exploring the mediums of painting, drawing and collage. Rios’ work can be found in many international collections, a.o. the Fries Museum in Leeuwarden, NL, Daros Latin America Collection, Zurich, CH, MoMA, New York, USA, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA, and Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA), Barcelona, ES, and is included in a large number of private collections.
