A Conversation with Pablo Leon de la Barra

Omar López-Chahoud has been artistic director and curator of UNTITLED since its inception in 2012. As an independent curator, López-Chahoud has curated and co-curated numerous exhibitions in the United States and internationally. He has participated in curatorial panels at Artists’ Space, Art in General, MoMA PS1, and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City. López-Chahoud holds MFAs from the Yale University School of Art and the Royal Academy of Art in London.

Pablo León de la Barra, Curator at Large for Latin America at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, was born in Mexico City in 1972 and now resides in Rio de Janeiro. He holds a Ph.D. from the Architectural Association in London and has held prominent roles, including Guggenheim UBS MAP Curator, Latin America, and Chief Curator at MAC Niteroi. He has curated major exhibitions, such as Cecilia Vicuña’s Spin Spin Triangulene (2022) and Gego: Measuring Infinity (2023) at the Guggenheim, and is currently organizing shows for Gabriel Chaile in Uruguay and Allan Weber in the UK. León de la Barra has also contributed to global biennials and was awarded the Patricia Phelps de Cisneros and ICI Travel Award for Central America and the Caribbean in 2012.

Matteo Callegari’s work is deeply inspired by his experiences in the Amazon rainforest in Peru, where he explored the interconnectedness of nature and spirituality. His practice blends techniques to evoke the symbolic power of animals and landscapes, aiming to connect viewers with the natural world. Callegari holds an MFA from Hunter College, New York, and has exhibited internationally. In 2019, he founded the non-profit Light for the Amazon to preserve knowledge of healing traditions based on rainforest medicinal plants.

Vanessa Albury is an eco-visual artist and activist originally from Nashville and based in Brooklyn, New York, with an MFA in Studio Art from NYU’s Steinhardt School. Her work, spanning photography, sculpture, and social practice, focuses on environmental themes and healing through art and the ocean. As the founder of Coral Projects, she is creating eco-friendly underwater exhibitions to support coral reef regeneration. Albury’s innovative projects include NYC’s first biodegradable mural and installations addressing ecological and social issues, showcased internationally in collaboration with events like UN World Oceans Day and exhibitions across the USA and abroad.

Guadalupe Maravilla was born in 1976 in El Salvador and lives and works in Brooklyn, New York. He received a BFA from the School of Visual Arts and an MFA from Hunter College, City University of New York. Maravilla creates intricately layered paintings, large-scale sculptures, and therapeutic performances that draw from his personal history and Central American ancestry. Maravilla’s works examine issues of migration, disease, and generational trauma, while creating new rituals for care, healing, and regeneration. His work is in the permanent collections both nationally and internationally and he has received numerous awards and fellowships.