The Museo del Canal is starting an artist residency program

The Museo del Canal has everything ready to start its first artist residency program to carry out contemporary art projects in dialogue with its permanent collection, confirming the mission to be a platform for culture and art in all their expressions.

This program offers the possibility of developing a project in which Canal Museum that the permanent exhibition intervenes and casts a new layer of reflection, perspective and critical thinking on the exhibited heritage.

The residency takes place from January to March 2023, and the resulting works will be exhibited at Museum for the rest of the year.

spokespersons for Canal Museum They said that Giana De Dier was chosen among Panamanian contemporary artists to carry out a project that will intervene in part of the museum spaces, dialoguing in parallel with the exhibition. The artist’s proposal will take place in the “Life in the Canal Zone” room, which explores the diversity and identity of workers from 97 countries who contributed to the world-changing construction of the Panama Canal.

De Dier’s visual art questions the invisible stories behind family visual archives population of Antillean origin settled in Panama since the construction of its canal (19th-20th centuries).

De Dier creates collages from pictures contemporary and the archive combined with objects, textures and environments to shape the personality and move through the cultural spaces of the diaspora.

This artist’s work acts as file-based visual stories image within West Indian communities in Panama.

with his investigation it opposes the historical coverage of the panopticon and verisimilitude national archivesoffering the recreation of visual stories for Caribbean communities that have historically been invisible.

“I am very grateful for the invitation to carry out this artistic residency and to be able to expand mine practice and research. The residency was an excellent opportunity to work with the collection
of the canal museum, as well as having the space and resources to carry out new works”, commented De Dier.

The call for the second artistic residency program will be opened in the second half of 2023.