In the late 1970s, I lived in Guayaquil, Ecuador, the city where my mother was born. The contrast between my memories and experiences in Ecuador with my life in the US has been central to my practice, which uses personal narratives as a gateway to explore broader questions of place, identity and nationhood.

Karina Aguilera Skvirsky lives in New York City and works between New York and Ecuador. She is a multidisciplinary artist whose practice began in photography and grew into video and performance. In 2019, she received a grant from Creative Capital to produce How to Build a Wall and Other Ruins, a project that includes a series of hand-cut collages, a multichannel video installation and live performances. The multichannel video premiered in the 2021 Cuenca Biennial XV, curated by Blanca de la Torre, in Cuenca, Ecuador. Recent solo exhibitions include: Sacred Geometry at Museo Amparo in Puebla, Mexico and Ponce + Robles Gallery in Madrid, Spain. Other important international exhibitions include her participation in Africamericanos at Centro de la imagen in CDMX (2019) and There is Always a Cup of Sea for Man to Sail, the 29th São Paulo Biennial in Brazil (2010). Skvirsky is an Associate Professor at Lafayette College.