STATEMENT

Peñafiel’s work lays bare the brutal undercurrents of contemporary society, unveiling a fractured world trapped in an unending cycle of history and power. Through immersive installations, Peñafiel reframes our understanding of struggle, amplifying the voices of the marginalized to confront viewers with the deep-rooted forces that shape their reality. Drawing from personal and collective experiences of migration, Peñafiel’s work seeks to reimagine the boundaries between self and system, personal memory, and public history.

Using an interdisciplinary approach that spans sculpture, video, and site-specific projections, Peñafiel constructs intense visual environments designed to envelop audiences in disquieting worlds of distortion and control. His work borrows from the aesthetics of German Expressionism, reflecting a haunting visual language where harsh angles and dramatic contrasts mimic the fragmentation and tension of the marginalized existence. This expressionist influence marries with a more modern preoccupation: the omnipresence of surveillance. Peñafiel’s installations often include projections, found objects, and sound that evoke the unrelenting gaze of bureaucratic systems, amplifying the feeling of vulnerability in the face of unseen power structures.

In works like MARE MAGNVM: A Floridian Odyssey and Ni Aquí, Ni Allá, Peñafiel leverages his medium to confront themes of migration, forced labor, and socio-political alienation. By blending symbolic elements with physically constructed environments, he transports audiences into settings where the line between reality and illusion blurs. This is not mere escapism but a calculated disruption; viewers are invited to lose themselves in these meticulously constructed spaces, only to rediscover the uncomfortable parallels to real-world scenarios of displacement and inequality. The spaces become microcosms of society’s cyclical oppression and expose the psychological toll exacted on those navigating lives within these frameworks.

Peñafiel’s visual narratives evoke an emotional and visceral dialogue that destabilizes passive viewing. His use of distorted environments and disorienting perspectives reflect the sense of alienation often felt by individuals displaced within their own societies, whether by socio-economic forces, political crises, or historical trauma. Each piece becomes a fragment of a larger, ongoing investigation into how power permeates even the most personal aspects of identity and place.

Peñafiel’s installations are engineered to be experienced—where viewers must navigate complex terrains of physical and emotional displacement. For Peñafiel, this act of navigation mirrors the daily journeys of millions who must reconcile their sense of self with the relentless pull of institutionalized control. In fostering this experience, Peñafiel’s work transcends traditional art viewing, urging participants to question the power dynamics in their own lives and challenge the systems that render certain voices invisible.

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