Iván Gaete is a self-taught multidisciplinary artist who transforms simple, everyday materials and items into playful, thought-provoking works that invite viewers to re-examine the ordinary. His intricate drawings, paper constructions, photographs and installations are multi-­layered surveys that explore the transfer of matter, both physical and conceptual. He connects mapping, cosmology and social sculpture using a wide range of systematic and elaborated manual processes.

Deeply rooted in the language of drawing, his work focuses on capturing physical gestures and temporal traces that highlight the transformative existence of life, raising questions about mobility, portability and labor gendering. He states: “through the tactile, visceral experience of making work using the hands, the structural world, usually invisible to the naked eye, is revealed.”

Gaete is the recipient of a BRIO Visual Arts award from the Bronx Council on the Arts and multiple fellowships. Residency program highlights include The Laundromat Project, Denniston Hill, Residency Unlimited, Artists Alliance and The Wassaic Project. In New York, his work has been exhibited at The Bronx Museum of the Arts, Bronx Arts Space, Bronx River Arts Center, Smack Mellon, NurtureArt, and The Clemente Center, among others. He lives and works in The Bronx.

Space to Connect Programming

Gaete has hosted pop-up art-making activities in collaboration with events at Fordham Plaza in The Bronx.