*The Only Guatemalan Adoptee in Essex by José Mario Dellow @ TOMA Project Space, Unit 13, Royals Shopping Centre, Southend, SS1 1DG

The opportunity to see ‘The Only Guatemalan Adoptee in Essex’ in real life has passed, however we would like to invite you to watch all of the exhibition content HERE for free!

Opening: Saturday 26/09/20 1-6pm

Open: 26/09/20 - 02/01/21 with usual opening times: Saturday + Sunday 12-5pm

FREE online talk from Professor Monica Dowling ‘Losses and Gains in International Adoption’ 31/10/20 2-4pm GMT / info HERE

The Only Guatemalan Adoptee in Essex is the second of two solo exhibitions happening this year offered to Essex artists who have had to put their art practice on hold in the past due to caring for others. The show launches on Saturday 26th September, all are welcome to an opening reception from 1-6pm.

José Mario Dellow was adopted from Guatemala, in Central America. Being born in a less economically developed country and growing up in a white Essex family has left him fascinated by luck, privilege, and social characteristics like class and race. This exhibition presents context around living as an adopted person from Guatemala in the UK. It includes contemporary political debate on adoption and the family, as well as the artist's auto-ethnographic research. The exhibition space will be transformed into a living room setting centred around televisions featuring a mixture of found footage and video works that include the artist's family in the style of Googlebox. Two conversations book-end the exhibition: it begins with a recent zoom meeting between José Mario and his grandmothers, and finishes with an audio reflection from three Guatemalan adoptees. Both conversations reflect on experiences of adoption but present different perspectives. As well as an opening, the exhibition will feature two live events. Dr Monica Dowling, an academic whose work focuses on adoption, will host a workshop in response to the exhibition. There will also be an online performance by other Guatemalan adoptees who were interviewed by José Mario and Maria Lovatt. The adoptees will perform an act of solidarity by reading from each other’s interviews and sharing their experiences with the audience. José Mario previously studied at the Ruskin School of Art, University of Oxford. He currently coordinates a behaviour support project in a secondary school in West London. His art practice often draws on this experience; making art with young people and questioning the institutional framework of schools.

Thank you to Arts Council England for funding towards our Project Space programme + The Royals Shopping Centre for supporting us with the space. The show is curated by Lolly Adams and assisted by Jessica Reeves. Our technicians are Shaun Badham and Matthew Curtis Knight. A series of prints by José Mario are available in the TOMA shop.

* Instagram: @jose_mario_dellow * Website: www.josemariodellow.co.uk