In the exhibition “The Unknown Boricuas+ Prisoner: Abu Ghraib,” Brooklyn-born Puerto Rican artist Juan Sánchez “documents the juxtaposition between political prisoners and civil rights leaders, questions powers of politics and religion, and brings to light the lesser-known histories of the Puerto Rican liberalist movement.” The exhibition opened on February 12 and is on view until March 27 at the Lorenzo Homar Gallery, located at 2721 N. 5^th Street in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

The prints included in “The Unknown Boricuas+ Prisoner: Abu Ghraib” were created for Taller Puertorriqueño’s 35th Anniversary exhibition season The Graphic R/Evolution and as an independent project of Philadelphia’s first international print quadrennial The Graphic Unconscious, running from January 29 – April 11, 2010. Art critic Lurie Lipman describes Sánchez as a “healer, an artist who takes elements of his culture fragmented by colonial and neocolonial powers, and works them into a restorative manner.” Juan Sánchez is best known as a graphic artist whose work combines photography, and a mix of print techniques often incorporating text and iconographic images of the Taíno, African, and Spanish traditions in Puerto Rico. The catalogue featuring the new series includes an essay by independent curator Rebeca Noriega-Costas who has worked with the Museo del Barrio and the Brooklyn Museum in New York City.

Taller Puertorriqueño’s Lorenzo Homar Gallery is open Mondays through Fridays from 9:00am to 5:00pm and Saturdays from 11:00am to 5:00pm. Bearing the name of one of Puerto Rico’s greatest graphic visual artists, the Lorenzo Homar Gallery is the region’s only art gallery dedicated to Latin American and Caribbean art.

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