PLAYA GAMEPLAYARTS CURATED BY BRYAN MUNGUIA JULY 18 — AUGUST 3 2024 Image courtesy of Murakit Gameplayarts is pleased to present Playa, a survey of Mexico-based artists informed by post-Internet worldbuilding. This summer, Los Angeles and its seasonal tourists are invited to immerse themselves in an exotic, simulated paradise. Playa unfolds as an ironic theater of Western desires, mirroring modern commercial worldbuilding logic to transform the gallery space into a faux Mexican beach resort. This setting authentically reflects a yearning for foreign utopias, weaving nostalgia and romantic idealism into an interactive dreamscape. The works of Mexican multidisciplinary artists Alonso Cedillo (Mexico City), Murakit (Mexico City), Caro Lucero (Mexico City), Fernando Gress Muñoz (Mexico City), Alicia Valladeres (Mexico City), Juanna Pedro (Xochimilco), and Clutch (Guadalajara) reinterpret popular visual culture through various appropriations. Each artist offers a unique critique of Western imagination through post-Internet practices, creating a multidimensional showcase encompassing video games, digital art, drawings, and Internet-based curatorial projects like Patadas de Ahogadx from Centro Cultural Kappa (Guadalajara) and Neo_Tortellería (Guanajuato). Typically a site of hedonistic attraction, the resort blurs distinctions between high and low culture, revealing a critical awareness of the kitschiness that comes from situating common culture objects in formal contexts. The artists draw on digital aesthetics of the 1990s when U.S.-transferred pop culture hit a cultural apex in Mexico. Caricatures of the appropriative West, such as video game culture and Japanese manga, resonate deeply within the Mexican collective subconscious raised in Web 1.0. This interplay of idyllic nostalgia and transnational internet aesthetics builds an inverted type of utopia meant to confront Western sensibilities. Playa will be on view at Gameplayarts, 5511 W Pico Blvd, from July 18 to August 3, 2024. An opening reception will be held on Thursday, July 18, from 6 to 10 pm, featuring a musical performance from participating artist Murakit at 9 PM. The exhibition welcomes walk-in visitors on Thursdays from 6 to 9 p.m. and Saturdays from 12 to 5 p.m. – EXHIBITOR LIST Alonso Cedillo Murakit Caro Lucero Fernando Gress Muñoz Alicia Valladres Juanna Pedro Clutch Centro Kappa Cultural Neo_Tortellería Patadas de Ahogadx: cdmx.exe, Nathan Harper, Juanna Pedro, Muri pixel, Vidal Martínez, Jehieli Kinnereth, Paula Reyes-Pérez, 3.14 conejos, Emilio Ferrer, Ana Karenm, César Rendón, Gabriel Lengeling, Mariana Ledesman, Emilio Morales, Arturo Olmos, Roberto Delgadillo