Announcing the 2021 Critical Mass Awardee

Federico Estol: Critical Mass 2021 Solo Show Recipient

Blue Sky is pleased to announce the Photolucida Critical Mass 2021 Blue Sky Solo Show recipient, Federico Estol. Estol’s series, Shine Heroes, will open in Portland at Blue Sky in April 2022. Estol’s work was selected for the award by the Blue Sky Exhibitions Committee from the Critical Mass Top 200. 

"There are 3000 shoe shiners who go out into the streets of La Paz and El Alto suburbs each day in search of clients. They are from all ages and in recent years have become a social phenomenon in the Bolivian capital.

What characterizes this tribe is the use of ski masks so they will not be recognized by those around them. They confront the discrimination they face through these masks; in their neighborhoods no one knows that they work as shoe shiners, at school they hide this fact, and even their own families believe they have a different job when they head down to the center of the city from El Alto.

The mask is their strongest identity, what makes them invisible while at the same time unites them. This collective anonymity makes them tougher when facing the rest of society and is their resistance against the exclusion they suffer because they carry out this work." - @federicoestol

About the Award

Each year the Blue Sky Exhibitions Committee, in partnership with Photolucida, selects one artist from the Critical Mass Top 200 for a solo exhibition at the gallery. The selected work is typically exhibited in April to coincide with Photolucida’s Annual Portfolio Review. 

images © Federico Estol