Artist
Ruth Montel Arias
Ruth Montel Arias graduated in Applied Arts from the Pablo Picasso Higher School of Arts in A Coruña, she completed the Master of Corporate Identity at the Pompeu Fabra UPF University in Barcelona during 2005-06, and the Master of Photography EFTI in 2010. Her projects investigate the human relationship with natural territory, and its derived conflicts of domination and animal, social and environmental oppression.
Her photographs have been shown and published in different media and communication such as El Diario.es, La Marea, ABC, El País, Vice, Grupo EFE, RTVE and TVG. Her work has been exhibited in cultural institutions such as the Cultural Center of Spain in Lima, Landkreis Galerie in Germany, Museum of Memory in Argentina, La Casa Encendida, National Calcografía, Círculo de Bellas Artes, Conde Duque Cultural Center, and Matadero in Madrid, Cristina Enea Foundation in Donostia or Cidade da cultura in Santiago de Compostela.
She has also exhibited in galleries in Madrid: Galería Zero, Galería Liebre, La New Gallery and Noestudio. International galleries such as Galería Moproo in Shanghai and Galería Ruby in Buenos Aires. Her work has been selected in different competitions, as well as national scholarships and artistic residences. Standing out the Resident Culture 2020, Best Photo Essay Lifestyle of the Ottawa International Vegan Film Festival 2019, 2017 VEGAP Creation Grant, Scholarships Abroad at the Museum of Contemporary Art (MAC) of A Coruña 2015 and finalist in Fotopres La Caixa 2015.
Bestiae
Bestiae is the photographic and audiovisual work that the artist Ruth Montiel Arias carried out between 2017 and 2018 thanks to the Vegap production grants 2017. The work reflects on animal domination through hunting, dialoguing between visual poetry and documental approaches.
During the development of Bestiae, Ruth Montiel Arias accompanied several groups of hunters in different provinces of the Spanish state. This has led her to learn first-hand about the methods and execution of this practice as well as, after hours of conversation, analyzing the arguments that are used to hold an outdated custom not approved by today's society.
Bestiae reflects on animal murder and the "animality" of the act itself, dialoguing between the real and the symbolic, inheritance and intellect, culture and tradition. With a language in which own images coexist with manipulated ones, this essay proposes an analysis of masculine domination over the animal, and how it is related through gender, art, war and disease based on a personal fusion between visual poetics and documentary language.