16.09.23 – 19.11.23, Pablo Helguera

Beautiful Eccentrics, Central Casting

On January 1, 2021 Pablo Helguera published The Pretenses of Failure, the very first column on his blog Beautiful Eccentrics.

Fast forward three years, more than a hundred columns and over 4000 weekly readers later, and Pablo Helguera has answered KIOSK’s invitation to stage a solo exhibition with Beautiful Eccentrics: Central Casting—a visually compelling three-dimensional translation of nine of his columns.

Helguera’s writing touches upon a variety of topics within the contemporary art world, such as art theft, the absence or presence of an audience, and the generic commercialization of artworks. Beautiful Eccentrics: Central Casting also functions as a playful discovery of the artist’s practice from his youth years to the present day. The nine selected texts at its base will be published as a collection of books available for purchase at KIOSK.

Selected columns

• Beautiful Eccentrics # 21 - Guise and Dolls
• Beautiful Eccentrics # 24 - Give It Away
• Beautiful Eccentrics # 42 - The Small Inconveniences of Art Theft
• Beautiful Eccentrics # 46 - The One-Trick Pony Trap
• Beautiful Eccentrics # 47 - Tío Pancho, Art Teacher
• Beautiful Eccentrics # 55 - Boteros in the Cereal Section
• Beautiful Eccentrics # 57 - A Shoe Is a Shoe Is a Shoe Is a Shoe
• Beautiful Eccentrics # 59 - Label Intolerance
• Beautiful Eccentrics # 70 - The Persistence of Eponymity