Ceiba: Reconsidering Ephemeral Spaces

William Córdova is an interdisciplinary cultural practitioner born in Lima, Peru. He lives and works Lima, Miami, and New York City. Córdova’s work addresses the metaphysics of space and time and how objects change and perception changes when we move around in space. He received a BFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago,1996 and an MFA from Yale University, 2004.

Córdova been in residence at The Studio Museum in Harlem, Museum of Fine Arts in Houston’s CORE/MFAH program, Headlands Center for the Arts, Artpace, Skowhegan School of Painting & Sculpture, LMCC, McDowell Colony, Woodstock Center for the Arts among others. He has exhibited in the US, Latin America, Europe and Asia. His work is in the public collection at the Whitney Museum of American Art, Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, the Yale Art Gallery, New Haven, CT, Museo de Arte de Lima, Lima, Peru, Ellipse Foundation, Cascais, Portugal, Perez Art Museum, Miami, FL, La Casa de las Americas, Havana, Cuba among others. Córdova was represented in the 2010 Museum of Modern Art/PS1 Greater New York exhibition, an overview presentation of contemporary artists whose contributions to the arts have had a significant influence in society. In 2011 Córdova was invited for his first one person museum exhibition in Europe, yawar mallku: royalty, abductions y exiles at La Conservera, Murcia, Spain and also awarded the Joan Mitchell Foundation Grant. He participated in the prestigious American Academy in Berlin Fellowship (2013), Prospect.3 New Orleans Biennial (2014), and the 12th Havana Biennial, Havana, Cuba (2015). 
In 2016, William Cordova participated in the SITE Santa Fe Biennial, New Mexico, and upcoming, will exhibit in Southern Accents, at the Nasher Museum, Durham, NC and Oakland Museum of Art, CA. Additionally, Cordova will present solo exhibitions at Sikkema Jenkins, NY, and 80M2 Livia Benavides Gallery, Lima, Peru. Fellowships will include the Joan Mitchell Center, New Orleans and Montalvo Art Center, CA.

ceiba: reconsidering ephemeral spaces explores topics implicative of transcultural migration through a multimedia installation centered around Fort Mose in St. Augustine, Florida, an area founded in 1739 by runaway African slaves and Native Americans fleeing British persecution. Just over two decades later, in 1763, the group relocated to Ceiba Mocha, Mantanzas, Cuba. The exhibition, comprised of reclaimed ephemera, film, photography, sound, and more, links these early migrations with the movement of more than 80 Asian, Black, and Latinos from America to Cuba between 1968 and 1971— a time typically associated with Cuban exile into the US.

The exhibition, related programming, and brochure are made possible through the support of the Herb Jackson and Laura Grosch Gallery Endowment, Malú Alvarez ’02, and the Davidson College Friends of the Arts.