LEO CASTANEDA

ARTISTIC JOURNEY

Leo Castaneda (born in Cali, Colombia 1988) is an artist based in Miami and New York, who works in the intersection of painting and virtual reality.

He uses these among other mediums such as drawing, interactive sculpture, and animation to analize and deconstruct the structures of video-games, and how these structures relate to those of Art and the world at large.

Castaneda received his BFA from Cooper Union in 2010, and in 2014 is finishing up his MFA at Hunter College. In 2014 Castaneda received a scholarship from the Cisneros Foundation to attend SOMA Summer in Mexico City. He has also attended a semester abroad in Universitat de Barcelona, Spain, and studied in New World School of the Arts in Miami.

"My work is an effort to turn the structures of video gaming into a lens to analize the world. "Levels", "Bosses", "Items", "Continues", "Extra Lives", and much more are the words that dominate the world of virtual entertainment. These labelling systems delineate and provide hierarchies reminiscent of both ancient mythologies and corporate structures, while highlighting the arbitrariness of their boundaries and naming".

SOLO EXHIBITION

2022 Herramientas: Levels & Bosses, Locust Projects, (Miami, FL) 2021 Demo(s): Levels&Bosses, Tile Blush Gallery, (Miami, FL) 2019-20 Live Inventory, The Wolfsonian Museum -FIU: Art of Illumination commission, (Miami, FL) 2017 Launch Scenarios, Tete-ahh-tete.net Mechanica, collaboration with composer Molly Joyce, Garner Arts Center, (Garner, NY) 2016 Items in Varied Renders, IRL Institute, (Miami, FL) 2012 Levels and Bosses, ArtSeen Gallery, (Miami, FL) 2011 Drawings, MRKT, Wynwood District, (Miami, FL) Stage(s), Flagler Arts Space, (Miami, FL) 2010 Moments in Level One, The Hall of Great Bosses and The Others, Cooper Union Great Hall Gallery and Great Hall, (New York, NY) 2009 Levels Bosses and Items, Cooper Union Sixth Floor lobby, Foundation Building, (New York, NY)

GROUP EXHIBITION

2024 TRANSFER Download: Sea Change, Peréz Art Museum (Miami, FL) (Upcoming) Poli/grafica-Triennial, (San Juan, Puerto Rico) 2023 NOVA-Supercreativity Biennial, FILE Festival, Museu do Amanhã, (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) No Vacancy, Miami Beach Art in Public Places, (Miami, FL) Catalyst, Knight Foundation Forum, New World Symphony, (Miami, FL) Embodiments: Negron Pizzaro Gallery, Untitled Art Fair, (Miami, FL) Recursive Value,TRANSFER Gallery with Oolite Arts, (Miami, FL) Media Under Dystopia 4.0, Mud Foundation, (Miami, FL) 2022 Alter Gaming, FILE Festival, (Sao Paulo, Brazil) Apuntes Americanos, Alianza Francesa, (Lima, Peru) Media Under Distopia 2.0, MUD Foundation, (Miami, FL) 2021 Radical Gaming, Haus der Elektronischen Künste, Basel, (Switzerland) Walgreens Windows Oolite Arts, (Miami, FL) Game Jam Lab, Museo La Tertulia, (Cali, Colombia) 2020 Work from Home, Bass Museum, (Miami, FL) Vision Acuity, Clandestina + DSQ Projects, (Miami, FL) Time to Play: Art and Culture Center, (Hollywood, FL) 2019 Inflexão, The Wrong Biennial, SESC, (Sao Paulo, Brazil) Playground, Dot 51 Gallery, curated by Veronica Flom and Camilo Godoy, (Miami, FL) Altered States of Conciousness, curated by Claire Breukel, Oolite Arts, (Miami, FL) Art, Artists & You, Children’s Museum of Manhattan, (New York, NY) 2018 New Art Florida, Florida Atlantic University Gallery, (West Palm Beach, FL) Art Nova 100, Guardian Art Center, (Beijing, China) Augmented Sunrise Beneath My Skin, Gru_nd, (Berlin, Germany) Activatar, IOS store augmented reality app, Online+ NJ Education as the Practice of Freedom, Young Arts, (Miami, FL) Emergency Contacts, Placeholder Gallery, (Miami, FL) Between a View and a Milestone, Art Center/South Florida, (Miami, FL) The Big Short, Artist’s Institute, (New York, NY) 2017 The Fourth AIM Biennial, Bronx Museum of the Arts, (Bronx, NY) Seeing, LATE Activation and lecture, Frost Science Museum, (Miami, FL) Let there be Light, Espacio Art Nexus, (Bogota, Colombia) Visiones: Latinx Videogame Artists, Indie Grits Film Festival, curated by the Digital Museum of Digital Art, (Columbia, SC.) Bochinche, Collaboration with Alejandro Guzman, Faena Art, (Miami, FL) Coral Orgy, Borscht Film Festival, New World Center, (Miami, FL) CTRL, The Projects, (Ft. Lauderdale FL.) 2016 Paper Hotshots: El Museo del Barrio at Blackburn, Blackburn Printshop, (NewYork, NY) Art and Technology: Alumni Exhibition, New World School of the Arts, (Miami, FL) The Wax in our Wings, Placeholder Gallery, (Miami, FL) News and Weather, Vox Populi, (Philladelphia, PA) Play: in collaboration with composer Molly Joyce, Art Center S/F, (Miami, FL) 2015 “Of Games III”, Khoj International Artists Association, (New Delhi, India) Uncanny, Curated by Helena Acosta, Reverse Art Space, (Brooklyn, NY) Digital Vitality, The Projects, (Ft. Lauderdale FL) 2014 MFA Thesis Exhibition, Hunter College Galleries, (New York, NY) We are Not, SOMA, (Mexico city, Mexico) 2013 Superreal: Alternative Realities in Photography and Video, Museo del Barrio, (New York) Transmediation, Stephan Stoyanov Gallery, (New York, NY) 2012 All about Art, Frost Art Museum, (Miami, FL) Algo Diferént, Associated Gallery, (Brooklyn, NY) 2011 Electric Wedding, Wetheat Projects Miami Beach Cinematheque, (Miami, FL) 2010 Natural Selection, CGAF Gallery, (Miami FL) Field of Dreams, Bruce High Quality Foundation, Prospect Park, (Brooklyn, NY) On Alternate Realities, Cooper Union, (NY, New York)

AWARDS

2023 Knight/USA Artists Art+Tech Fellowship Young Arts Artist Technology Fellowship Vortic Prize Digital Art Untitled Art Fair Bakehouse Art Complex Resident Oolite Arts Acquisitions 2022 Emergent Strategy Institute Praxis Fellow 2021 Harpo Foundation Grant 2018 South Florida Cultural Consortium, Miami Dade Art in Public Places Ellies Grant, Oolite Arts (also 2021) WaveMaker Grant, Locust Projects 2017 Bronx Museum AIM Program Fellowship Oolite Arts Residency (through 2019) Espinasse 31 residency, Milan, Italy 2015 KHOJ International Artists Association “Of Games III”, New Delhi, India 2014 SOMA Summer, Mexico City, Mexico Hunter College Cisneros Scholarship for SOMA Summer 2010 Irving and Arlene Tashlick Award,Cooper Union 2010 Utrecht Art Competition, Grand Prize 2006 Young Arts Foundation Silver Winner

ART FAIRS

2023 NOVA-Supercreativity Biennial, FILE Festival, Museu do Amanhã, (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) 2022 Alter Gaming, FILE Festival, (Sao Paulo, Brazil) 2018 Art Nova 100, Guardian Art Center, (Beijing, China) 2017 The Fourth AIM Biennial, Bronx Museum of the Arts, (Bronx, NY)