‘Illusion Brought Me Here’ maps out the extensive body of work of Mexican artist Mario García Torres for the first time.

New essays by Sophie Berrebi, Julia Bryan-Wilson, Rulo David, Vincenzo de Bellis, Caroline Dumalin, and Tom McDonough look at the way García Torres’s work addresses ideas of failure, uncertainty, and memory, and at how the counter-narratives he weaves invite us to revisit and rethink the legacies of conceptual art in the Americas and Europe.

This catalogue, published on the occasion of the artist’s first survey exhibition in the US and in Europe, also features a richly illustrated and annotated selection of nearly fifty works, the most comprehensive compilation of the artist’s practice available in print.

‘In Spanish, my native tongue, ‘ilusión’ has more than one meaning. It can suggest a misinterpretation of the senses, something like a deceptive appearance, or a figment of the imagination. But the word can also be used to convey a sense of hope, of favourable expectations: ‘Ilusión me trajo aquí’ is thus both an anticipation that something fortuitous might happen here, and a misleading view, the figment or mirage that launched a personal journey into art.’ (Mario García Torres).

Accompanies the exhibition ‘Mario García Torres: Illusion Brought Me Here’ 25 Oct 2018 – 17 Feb 2019, Walker Art Center, Minneapolis and also 17 May – 18 Aug 2019, WIELS Contemporary Art Centre, Brussels.

This is the first book to survey the work of Mario García Torres.