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Daniel Otero Torres

Amigos Ancestrales, 2024

Exhibition view, Sonidos del Crepúsculo (Twilight sounds), curated by Lorenzo Fusi, Currier Museum of Art, Manchester, United States. © Daniel Otero Torres
Collection
Daniel Otero Torres

Daniel Otero Torres

Amigos Ancestrales, 2024

Mixed media on wood

360 x 75 x 100 cm

TBA21 Thyssen-Bornemisza Art Contemporary Collection

 

 

Amigos Ancestrales is a visual homage to the often-overlooked heroes of environmental protection. Conceived specifically for the exhibition Sonidos del Crepúsculo (Twilight Sounds), the work reflects Daniel Otero Torres’s enduring engagement with rural and peripheral communities, collective agency, and the invisible structures of power that shape lived realities.

Employing his distinctive technique of photorealistic drawing on stainless steel alongside new sculptural forms in wood, Otero Torres constructs totemic monuments that commemorate the courage and sacrifice of environmental defenders—many of them from Latin America—whose lives and voices have been silenced by extractive industries and exploitative political systems.

Situated between drawing, sculpture, and installation, Amigos Ancestrales does not represent specific individuals or trace a linear narrative. Instead, it gives form to a collective—and often transnational—struggle. Otero Torres’s imagery emerges through a collage-like process, incorporating references drawn from archival photographs, digital media, and global news. Through this layered visual language, he maps the complexity of control, resistance, and the overlapping forces at work in a globalized world.

While rooted in specific cultural and geographic contexts, Otero Torres’s installations resonate with universal urgency. They center stories of marginalized communities, amplify suppressed voices, and confront viewers with the interconnectedness of environmental and social justice. Amigos Ancestrales stands not only as a memorial but also as a call for remembrance, recognition, and action.

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