Maria Jose Argenzio (Guayaquil, 1977), selected by the magazine Vanguardia as one of the 12 most important women of the arts in Ecuador, is one of the great promises of contemporary Latin American art.
After coating a banana tree in gold in 2010 and build nine Corinthian columns from bakers fondant in 2012, the artist takes up the themes of colonialism and the fake identity of the past of her country to present her first project produced for La Caja Blanca.
Argenzio evokes idealization, by Ecuadorian society, of the social structures imported in colonial times through deceptive materials which represent the false opulence. Her magnificent embroidered fabrics are made by traditional craftsmen to build a nostalgic iconography that denounces the rejection of this society towards indigenous ancestral origins.
