Cànon

Since the time of classical Greek sculpture, the canon has defined what Western culture considers the perfect or ideal proportions of the human body. Over time, this supposedly harmonious proportional standard has become an instrument of civic, ethical and aesthetic education, while also serving as a normative imposition on moral and social behaviour. By challenging this canon, Mateo Maté exposes the hyper-normativity that governs standards of gender, race, age and humanity, both within sport and beyond.

Mateo Maté
 

He has held solo exhibitions at the Ulsan Art Museum (South Korea, 2023), the Weserburg Museum (Bremen, 2021), the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna (Rome, 2020), Galería Isabel Aninat (Santiago de Chile, 2018), Sala Alcalá 31 (Madrid, 2017), Max Weber Six Friedrich Gallery (Munich, 2014), Lázaro Galdiano Museum, Cerralbo Museum, the National Library of Spain, and the Museum of Romanticism (Madrid, 2013), the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía (Madrid, 2012), the Siqueiros Museum (Mexico City, 2011), Matadero Madrid (2010), the Patio Herreriano Museum (Valladolid, 2008), and Grita Insam Gallery (Vienna, 2005–08), among others.

His work has also been featured in international and national museums and art centers such as the Centro Botín (Santander, 2020), Centro de Arte 2 de Mayo (Madrid, 2020), Artium (Vitoria, 2018), the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum (Madrid, 2017), the Miró Foundation (Barcelona, 2015), MART (Trento, 2014), La Nuit Blanche (Paris, 2014), the Hirshhorn Museum (Washington, 2014), the Tàpies Foundation (Barcelona, 2013), the Herzliya Museum (Tel Aviv, 2012), the Museum of Contemporary Art (Santiago de Chile, 2012), the Berardo Museum (Lisbon, 2011), BOZAR (Brussels, 2010), Jeu de Paume (Paris, 2007), PS1 MoMA (New York, 2003), among many others.