Can restoration turn out to be artwork? The newly reopened Laboratorio Arte Alameda (LAA) in Mexico Metropolis’s historic centre seeks to reply this query by way of a singular venture exploring the intersection of restoration and creative experimentation.
Housed in a former Sixteenth-century convent, the museum had been closed since 30 December 2025 for restoration. It reopened earlier this month with a site-specific venture by the Mexican artist Pablo Rasgado, who was in residence all through the restoration. Layers of wall paint from totally different durations, reworked copies of colonial work and restoration particles all kind a part of Rasgado’s exhibition Pentimento (till 18 October).
The LAA, which opened in 2000, is housed one of many metropolis’s oldest buildings. Development of the Franciscan convent of San Diego, close to Alameda Central, started in 1591. The location was a big one through the Mexican Inquisition: between 1596 and 1771, the sq. in entrance of the convent served as an execution floor the place these condemned had been burned on the stake. Years later, the convent constructing hosted the Pinacoteca Virreinal (1964-2000), displaying 350 colonial work earlier than the gathering was relocated to the close by Museo Nacional de Arte.
The previous Templo de San Diego has housed Laboratorio Arte Alameda since 2000 Photograph: Aberusama, through Wikimedia Commons
Since opening, LAA has all the time emphasised experimental practices. Exhibiting works in an unlimited area with a layered historical past is a problem that the museum embraces. “The size provides artists a singular likelihood to work together with the area by way of site-specific initiatives,” says the LAA curator Gemma Argüello, noting that previous initiatives have engaged with the location’s historical past as properly.
An extended overdue restoration
LAA’s restoration was a few years within the making. The constructing was broken by the 2017 earthquakes and suffered from water infiltration. “The restoration consolidated the primary nave’s vaults and dome, in addition to the Chapel of Sorrows, addressing probably the most important earthquake harm,” says Claudia López Cherres, a website supervisor on the Centro Histórico Belief, which oversaw the restoration alongside Mexico’s Nationwide Institute of Anthropology and Historical past.
Invasive plant species had additionally grown within the crevices, prompting the necessity for a workforce of biologists to assist with restoration. However preservation was paramount. “The venture sought to protect the previous Templo de San Diego’s historic character moderately than alter its look,” López notes.
LAA’s curatorial workforce noticed restoration as a chance to reframe the establishment’s focus. “We wished to activate the museum as a laboratory for creative creation,” Argüello says. “The restoration allowed us to discover the constructing’s materials historical past and its historic makes use of.”
Rasgado, whose follow explores materials historical past by way of large-scale initiatives, fortunately took on the problem. Speculative archaeology guided his distinctive venture. “This important technique allowed me to merge fiction with reality, increasing narratives whereas incorporating parts of the constructing’s historical past,” Rasgado says. This required fixed adaptation. “In the course of the restoration, I witnessed the constructing’s entrails and labored on website by way of varied processes,” Rasgado provides, noting that collaboration with the restorers was key. For instance, they put aside a part of the greater than 13 tons of particles for Rasgado and his workforce to kind by way of and make use of.
Past pentimento
Rasgado attracts on portray and restoration strategies, which he reinterprets and—at occasions—deconstructs. Central to his venture is pentimento, a time period derived from the Italian pentirsi (“to repent”) that refers to adjustments made throughout portray that later turn out to be seen by way of infrared reflectography, X-rays and pigment decay. Rasgado expanded this idea by creating fictitious pentimenti over digital facsimiles of 27 colonial work that when hung on the Pinacoteca Virreinal.
“The stretchers and pine wooden had been subjected to totally different processes to simulate the unique items’ method and age,” Rasgado says. “My pentimenti create a brand new narrative whereas exploring the portray course of.”
Rasgado’s Pentimento (2026) Photograph: Felipe Huerta, courtesy Laboratorio Arte Alameda
A few of these reveal historic tensions. One such instance is a copy of Francisco Antonio Vallejo’s large-scale portray Glorificación de la Inmaculada (1774), put in the place the church’s altarpiece as soon as stood, with the sitters’ faces changed by pre-Hispanic figures.
“This pentimento refers to syncretism,” Rasgado says. “It takes inspiration from the pre-Hispanic altars found behind spiritual pictures.” However moderately than providing an upfront critique, it lets viewers draw their very own conclusions.
Different pentimenti are summary color explorations. As an alternative of pictures, the holes made in a single portray are positioned on a window within the church’s choir, illuminated by mild. “Restoration remodeled the environment from a darkish area, the place the vault was coated for security causes, right into a luminous one,” Argüello says.
Materials reminiscence
As a part of LAA’s restoration venture, archaeological home windows into pre-Hispanic occasions on the metropolis’s historic colonial-era websites had been additionally reinterpreted. Within the temple’s wood flooring, three rectangular-shaped reduce areas reveal particles and mouldings recovered throughout restoration. The adorned tiles that when adorned the temple’s vault, which couldn’t be reinstalled on account of their fragility and weight, are seen as properly.
These vestiges create a dialogue with Rasgado’s pentimenti. “They observe the identical logic,” he says. “Somewhat than reconstructing, these archaeological and painterly gestures concurrently open beforehand hid areas of reminiscence.” The artist has additionally created two benches made solely from restoration particles and resin, which supply a contemplative area.
Rasgado’s Pentimento (2026) Photograph: Felipe Huerta, courtesy Laboratorio Arte Alameda
The constructing’s towering, 19m-tall partitions additionally play an vital aesthetic position right here. Below Rasgado’s steering, restorers uncovered sections of paint from totally different historic eras ranging in color from black to purple to white, leading to a form of abstraction revealing layered timelines. In a reversal of the strappo restoration method, used to take away frescoes, Rasgado utilized pictures from his studio onto the museum partitions. Right here, once more, the historic layers are simply confused with the artist’s interventions.
Rasgado’s venture is something however static, and the artist plans to change his work in August. “There might be a second Pentimento, during which I’ll add new pictures to the present works,” he says. Performances by the artists Gabriel Acevedo Velarde and Adrián Bracho will accompany this second intervention.
However the restoration job will not be over but both. “Though probably the most important points have been stabilised, water infiltration, uncovered tezontle masonry and deterioration of the bell tower stay key challenges,” López says.
Within the meantime, Pentimento marks a brand new chapter for LAA—turning its constructing’s restoration into an archive, a medium and an area for reflection.
Pablo Rasgado: Pentimento, till 18 October, Laboratorio Arte Alameda, Mexico Metropolis
