Aimée Joaristi to present new work at Byron53 Gallery in Mexico City

We're thrilled for Aimée Joaristi who is due to open her solo exhibition in Mexico City featuring eight abstract works from Bestiario series.

Aimée Joaristi will present Bestiario, a new series of political portraits, at Byron53 Gallery in Mexico City on 7 February 2026. The exhibition comprises eight previously unseen abstract works exploring what curators Frency Cheshire and David Mateo describe as "the dark and unspoken aspects of power."

The exhibition in Mexico City coincides with the city's art week, coinciding with the reputable art fair Zona Maco, where Joaristi will also be represented by Rodrigo Rivero Lake. Her monographic book will launch at 5:30pm before the 7pm exhibition opening at Byron53 in Polanco.

Deformed faces and political theatre

Joaristi's Bestiario series emerged from her response to the current political climate, observing figures in Costa Rican electoral debates and international news coverage. The portraits present political characters as progressively deformed, filtered through what the artist describes as a mixture of soap opera, horror and fiction.

"The faces, filtered through personal subjectivity, appear increasingly altered," writes curator David Mateo in Culturamas. He positions the abstract portraiture as a strategic choice to represent hidden dimensions of political power.

The series title references the medieval bestiary tradition—illustrated compendiums cataloguing real and mythical creatures with moral lessons. Joaristi adapts this framework for contemporary politics, creating a taxonomy of political figures whose grotesque expressions reveal what she perceives as calculated self-interest beneath public personas.

Her approach to the work reflects immediacy and distance. Working from her studio in the Costa Rican hills, Joaristi processes global political imagery through layers of paint, allowing each portrait to accumulate meaning through her emotional, expressionist technique.

Born in Havana in 1957 and raised in Spain, Joaristi now works from her studio in the hills outside San José, Costa Rica. Her Cuban heritage and Latin American sensibility remains central to her practice. As the curators note, her perspective as a Cuban-born artist operating during Costa Rica's electoral process and global political upheaval inevitably shapes how political figures reveal themselves in her work.

The collaboration with Cuban curators Cheshire and Mateo for the exhibition in Mexico City proved particularly enriching for Joaristi, bringing shared political perspectives into dialogue with the work. Both curators have international experience and their interpretation frames the Bestiario paintings within broader conversations about power, representation and political spectacle in Latin America and beyond.

Joaristi's practice extends across painting, installation, performance and video, though painting remains her primary medium. Her canvases are characterised by forceful expressionism—energetic brushstrokes and dramatic contrasts that create depth through layers of oil and acrylic.

The Costa Rican landscape surrounding her studio also informs her work. The changing weather, shifting light and tropical foliage provide backdrop and influence to her compositions, connecting her interior design background with her painterly practice.

The artist has explored political themes previously in series including Petunia's Party and her commission for Saatchi Gallery, The End of the Beginning (2015), which addressed an unresolved 1986 criminal case in Costa Rica. Her work appears in public collections including the Wifredo Lam Museum in Cuba, the Museum of Decorative Arts and Design in Latvia, and the Museum of Contemporary Art of the Americas.

Curator David Mateo observes that the Bestiario paintings demonstrate the technical and symbolic sophistication Joaristi's work has achieved. The series represents a direct engagement with contemporary political imagery while maintaining the abstract approach that defines her neo-expressionist style.

Following the exhibition in Mexico City, Joaristi will present Descarnada, a solo exhibition surveying her recent Human Song series, at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Bogotá on 19 March 2026.

Bestiario opens 7 February at Byron53 Gallery, Lord Byron 53, Polanco, Mexico City. The exhibition runs for one month. Joaristi is represented by MÍRAME Fine Art in Costa Rica.

For more information on Joaristi or to inquire about her work, please contact Belinda Seppings: [email protected]

MÍRAME Contact Information:

Email: [email protected] Follow: Facebook | Instagram

Aimée Joaristi | Exhibition in Mexico City | 7 February 2026