Ivan Argote: How to Move a Monument on a Tuesday Morning
Curated by Pilar Tompkins Rivas | October 2026
Ivan Argote (b Bogotá, 1983) is a contemporary artist working in sculpture, public installation, film, painting, and performance. His work reimagines how we use and understand public space, blending critique of historical and social injustices with moments of tenderness, humour, and poetic rebellion. Argote challenges dominant narratives and invites audiences to rethink relationships between people, power, and place.
In his upcoming solo exhibition, How to Move a Monument on a Tuesday Morning, Argote brings together sculpture and moving images to explore how monuments shape history, memory, and public space. Central to the show is Levitate, a three-channel video installation that revisits the removal of colonial-era monuments in Rome, Madrid, and Paris. Through these scenes, Argote reflects on migration, identity, and the ways historical symbols are questioned and transformed over time.
How to Move a Monument on a Tuesday Morning will also introduce new works. One, titled Wild Flowers, is a series of sculptures reproducing different parts of historic public figures, in this case being Christopher Columbus. This work continues Iván Argote's exploration of reappropriating statues commemorating nations' "great men"
Argote has created major public installations worldwide — from Venice and New York to Paris, Bogotá, São Paulo, Douala, and London — and exhibited at leading institutions such as Palais de Tokyo (Paris), Centre Pompidou (Paris), Rudolfinum Gallery (Prague), MASP (São Paulo), SCAD Museum (Savannah), and MALBA (Buenos Aires). His works are held in major collections including MoMA, the Guggenheim, Centre Pompidou, Reina Sofía, LACMA, and MCA Chicago, among others. Argote lives and works in Paris, France.