A new monograph published to accompany Beatriz González’s major retrospective at the Barbican Art Gallery traces the six-decade career of the Colombian artist (1938–2026), whose radical reworking of everyday imagery reshaped the visual language of contemporary Latin American art. Bringing together more than 150 works and over 300 images, the volume charts González’s bold engagement with power, memory and political history across painting, sculptural assemblage and large-scale public installations.
Known in Colombia as La Maestra — “The Teacher” — González was not only an artist but also a curator, archivist, educator and art historian. Across her career, she examined how images circulate through society, asking what they reveal about power, grief and collective memory. Drawing from newspapers, religious iconography and Western art history, she dismantled traditional hierarchies of imagery, transforming familiar visuals into a bold graphic language uniquely her own.
Her early series The Sisga Suicides (1965) reinterpreted a newspaper photograph of tragedy through stylised colour and repetition, setting the tone for a practice that moved fluidly between satire and sorrow. Later works pushed the boundaries of where art might exist: pieces such as Kennedy (John Fitzgerald)… (1971) and Interior Decoration (1981) incorporated furniture, wallpaper and architectural space, turning everyday domestic objects into charged carriers of political memory.
Throughout her work González addressed the cycles of violence that have shaped modern Colombian history, alongside the lingering legacies of colonialism and displacement. Her approach was often direct yet layered with irony, tenderness and quiet resistance — a way of confronting historical trauma without relinquishing the power of visual invention.
Richly illustrated and extensively researched, the publication situates González within the broader cultural and political context of Colombia while highlighting the international resonance of her practice. Essays by Estrella de Diego, Cecilia Fajardo-Hill, Julieta González, Lotte Johnson, Diego Chocano and Miguel A. López are joined by reflections from artists including Luis Caballero, Amalia Pica and José Alejandro Restrepo.
More than a retrospective catalogue, the book offers a critical introduction to one of Latin America’s most influential artists — and to a body of work that continues to speak urgently to the relationship between images, politics and memory.
Beatriz González, edited by Lotte Johnson, with Diego Chocano, is published by Prestel to accompany the major exhibition at Barbican Art Gallery, London (25th February – 10th May 2026) and Astrup Fearnley Museet, Oslo (12th June – 11th October 2026). 304pp, 300 colour illustrations, 24 x 28 cm, £45.00 hardback MORE: HERE
