Born in 1974 and raised in Caguas Puerto Rico, Elsa María Meléndez is a printmaker and installation artist whose work challenges the traditional definitions of each medium. With an artistic career that spans over 25 years, Meléndez's practice focuses on exploring and denouncing gender inequality, the implementation of detrimental public policies, and the relationship between her personal experience and the social sphere. The context for these inquiries is, as Meléndez has stated, "the colonial status of the island of Puerto Rico and the absence of policies that guarantee well-being."
Including a selection of three-dimensional constructions, soft textiles, and large-scale embroidered pieces, Vengo de una isla de confusión is Meléndez's first solo museum exhibition outside of her native Puerto Rico. Together, these works embody the impulse to document uncertainty, expose cultural contradictions, and denounce misogyny in a style characteristic of the artist's production and her approach to local and universal issues. Oscillating between the intimate and the collective, Melendez's work invites visitors to question preconceptions about women's bodies and to consider the notion of art as a public square.
