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In the flow of my artistic practice, I conceive myself as an interlocutor between material and symbolic dimensions. My work is a constant conversation with my environment. I delve deeper from a transdisciplinary approach into themes that encompass corporeality and territory, emphasizing environmental challenges from an inclusive perspective that seeks to problematize hegemonic categories and narratives.

I live in Costa Rica and have established my workshop on the Nicoya peninsula, a land of contrasts and confluences. My most recent creations are nourished by the vibrant oceanic and tectonic energy of the tropics. Adding experiments that reveal my concerns and post-natural conditions.

As the daughter of a Peruvian migrant mother, I inherited a particular sensitivity towards textiles and primitive materials associated with the ceremonial, which I intertwined with an inexhaustible search for new media and materials discarded from the environment I inhabit. Through art I seek to illuminate hidden links, those that interweave the socio-political, the emotional, the intuitive and the imaginary.

For me, materialities are expressions that embody their underlying era and journeys. With them I explore transcending the barriers between the human, the artificial and the natural. My research focuses on adaptability, resilience, and emerging futures, clearing a path for the confluence of my personal identity with the collective narrative.

My art is a constant odyssey, a pilgrimage crossing a spectrum of media from drawing, painting, to video art, from the intervention of found objects to soft sculptures, from writing and performance. Forging circumstances where the everyday becomes the terrain of the imagination and the disturbing. My artistic projects are motivated by the firm conviction that art is a vehicle to investigate the intricate complexity of our existence.

―Karla Herencia
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Karla Herencia (Costa Rica, 1985-) is a Peruvian-Costa Rican transdisciplinary artist, educator, curator, and manager of cultural and social action projects. Her work explores themes related to the tensions generated by systems of domination, production, and resistance, as well as community feminisms, the (post)natural, and corporeality. Her artistic practice develops from an autobiographical and hybrid approach, constructing narratives with a strong poetic charge through fieldwork, territorial context analysis, material experimentation, and deriva (drifting).
 
Graduated in Art and Visual Communication and Master in Project Administration, graduated from the University of International Cooperation, with training in Performing Arts and Space Design at the National University of Costa Rica, she is a teacher and researcher at the National University of Costa Rica (UNA ) on topics of innovation, creative industries, active learning and audiovisual archives. She is an academic at the Teaching Research and Artistic Extension Center and was coordinator of the Research, Art and Transmedia Program. He directed the El Bosque Innovation Habitat project at UNA and continuous training projects to promote active learning.
 
Cultural manager and curator with emphasis on collaborative methodologies. She is co-founder of the Casa de Mujeres Artistas initiative (Casa MA) and curator of its first two exhibitions “Casa MA I Edition” and “Our eyes can't stop blinking.” Founder and agitator of the Central American and feminist collective WE WANT TO PAINT!
 
He worked on the consolidation of the Archive of the Study and Documentation Center - Side V of the TEOR/éTica Foundation. He has exhibited in prominent national museums, including the Museum of Costa Rican Art, Museum of Contemporary Art and Design, Rafael Ángel Calderón Guardia Museum, National Museum of Costa Rica, Museums of the Central Bank of Costa Rica, National Gallery of the Costa Rican Center for Science and Culture, TEOR/éTica, as well as international museums such as the Carlos Mérida National Museum of Modern Art (Guatemala), Centro León de Santiago de los Caballeros (Dominican Republic), among others. It is part of the Central American art publication "Entre Siglos: Contemporary Art of Central America and Panama", published by the Rozas Botrán Foundation. His works can be found in various private collections and in the public collection of the Rozas Botrán Foundation.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
 
2023. Bulegoa Z/B Artistic Residency in the Basque Country. Cultural Center of Spain, Spain.
2021. First place as “Experimental Short Film”, Veracruz World Film Festival, Mexico.
2019-2021. Winner of the academic fund for artistic projects "Interdisciplinary Initiatives", National University, Heredia, Costa Rica.
2015. Visual Artist in Geographies of Forgetting, PROARTES fund-winning project, San José, Costa Rica.
2014. Honorable mention in VALOARTE, IX edition, Costa Rica.
 
 
SOLO SHOWS:
 
2024. Sensitive oceanographies, curated by Dos Mares (France), Alliance Française, San José, Costa Rica.
2015. Corpórea Resistencia, Sophia Wanamaker Gallery, Costa Rican-North American Cultural Center, San José, Costa Rica.
 
 
GROUP SHOWS:

2025. Immersion: Artistic dialogues about the aquatic and the human, Cultural Center of Spain, San José, Costa Rica.
2024. MÍRAME Fine Art Highlights, Andaz Papagayo, Guanacaste, Costa Rica.
2024. Traces and existences: A palimpsest, Abra Espacio, San José, Costa Rica.
2024. Weird, Aleph Cultura by Klaus Steinmetz Contemporary, San José, Costa Rica.
2024. 40 Years of Spanish Cooperation in Costa Rica, Centro Cultural de España, San José, Costa Rica.
2024. Weaving with the sea: Textile art exhibition. Municipal Museum of Cartago, Costa Rica.
2024. Tijuana Pictorial International Triennial, Mexico.
2023. Situated Intersections, Rafael Ángel Calderón Guardia Museum, Costa Rica.
2023. Art in May, Rozas Botrán Gallery, Guatemala.
2023. Pi Art Festival, Museum of Contemporary Art of Punta Islita, Costa Rica.
2022. WE WANT TO PAINT!, San Ramón Regional Museum, Alajuela, Costa Rica.
2022. Tálamo, Colectivo en Fuga, CRFIC International Film Festival, San José, Costa Rica.
2021. Tálamo, Colectivo en Fuga, Veracruz World Film Festival, Mexico.
2021. Thorny horizon. Museum of Contemporary Art and Design (MADC), San José, Costa Rica.
2021. VALOARTE XIV, Artflow, San José, Costa Rica.
2020. Who hugs us? from Satisfactory, San José, Costa Rica.
2020. Feminine codes. Cultural Institute of Mexico in Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica.
2019. The immeasurable dimension of chaos: the life of Rolando Castellón in us, TEOR/éTica, San José, Costa Rica.
2018. Chibuzú Project: Interventions and approaches in Chinatown, Migrant Film Festival, San José, Costa Rica.
2017. Heroes, monsters, and other extraordinary beings. Museums of the Central Bank of Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica.
2016. The NoBiennial, Kroma Contemporary Art Gallery, San José, Costa Rica.
2015. Between Centuries: Contemporary Art from Central America and Panama, Carlos Mérida National Museum of Modern Art, Rozas Botrán Foundation, Guatemala.
2015. Geographies of Oblivion, Casa Domingueña de la Cultura, Heredia; Jesús Jiménez Zamora House, Cartago; Botica Solera Cultural Center, San José, Costa Rica.
2014. VALOARTE IX, Artflow, San José, Costa Rica.
2014. Textiles on the Edge, Sophia Wanamaker Gallery, Costa Rican-North American Cultural Center, San José, Costa Rica.
2013. Art Objects, National Gallery, Costa Rican Center for Science and Culture. Costa Rica, San José, Costa Rica.
2012. Ideas and Set. Golden Valley School, San José, Costa Rica.
2012. Proposals: Research Projects 2011-2012, Lola Fernández Gallery, National University, Heredia, Costa Rica.
2012. Evelyn Shame of House with the French Company Le Souse, International Arts Festival (FIA), San José, Costa Rica.
2010. VALOARTE PROJECT: Realities, National Museum, San José, Costa Rica.
2010. Rapid Painting, Museum of Costa Rican Art, San José, Costa Rica.
2010. Extreme Watercolor Contest, National Gallery, Costa Rican Center for Science and Culture, San José, Costa Rica.
2010. Group Ceramic Exhibition, Calderón Guardia Museum, San José, Costa Rica.
2010. IV International Ceramic Tile Triennial: Elit Tile, Centro León de Santiago de los Caballeros, Dominican Republic.
2009. Painting Exhibition, Joaquín García Monge Library, National University, Heredia, Costa Rica.
2009. 1+1=UNA, Alternative Gallery, San José, Costa Rica.
2009. Tiles, Rafael Ángel Calderón Guardia Museum, San José, Costa Rica.
2008. Scrap Metal Sculpture Garden, Monte de la Cruz, Heredia, Costa Rica.
2008. International Arts Festival, San José, Costa Rica.
2007. Transitarte, Municipality of San José, San José, Costa Rica.
2007. Handles, Andromeda Gallery, San José, Costa Rica.


MURAL PAINTINGS AND ARTISTIC INTERVENTIONS:

2010. Mural, National University (UNA) and the International Center for Sustainable Economic Policy (CINPE), Costa Rica.
2010. Mural, Nicoya Campus of the National University, Guanacaste, Costa Rica.
2009. Public Intervention, Celebration of 60 years of women's suffrage rights, with INAMU, San José, Costa Rica.
2008. Book Illustration, "Espacios que unen" and "Rutas de encuentro", National Commissioner for Human Rights of Honduras, CONADEH. Costa Rica.
2007. Body paint, Aproxímate Music Video (winner of the best music video award at the Ibero-American Festival in Caracas, Venezuela), Exnobia group. Costa Rica.
2006. Body paint, APREFLOFAS, San José, Costa Rica.


PRESENCE IN ART BOOKS:

2015. Entre Siglos: Contemporary Art of Central America and Panama, Rozas Botrán Foundation, Guatemala.


PRESENCE IN PUBLIC ART COLLECTIONS:

Rozas Botrán Foundation, Guatemala.


CURATION, ART PROJECT MANAGEMENT, AND TEACHING:

2022. ¡QUEREMOS PINTAR!. Regional Museum of San Ramón, curator and founder of the collective.
2022. El Bosque Project: Innovation Habitat at the Center for Research, Teaching, Education, and Artistic Extension (CIDEA-UNA). Academic project lead.
2022. Research, Art, and Transmedia Program at the National University, Academic Coordinator. Research Project. 
2019. Casa MA "Nuestros ojos no pueden parar de parpadear", Director and Chief Curator of the exhibition.
2018. Casa MA First Edition, Co-director and co-curator of the exhibition.
2018-2020. Casa MA -House of Women Artists-, Co-founder of the independent feminist project.
2016-2020. Teorética, Responsible and mediator of the Documentation and Archive Center, Lado V.
Omar Dengo Cultural Center of Heredia, Coordinator of the Visual Narratives artistic project.
2012-2014. Universidad Creativa, Professor of Image Theory.
2009-2010. Municipality of San José, Cultural Promoter:
                       Art and Culture in Neighborhoods Project in socially high-risk areas.
                       Luminotechnics Project at the Aires Navideños Festival, San Francisco de Dos Ríos.
2009. National System of Conservation Areas, Models and intervention project for the Poás Volcano Museum.
2009. IV Festival de las flores Heredia, Promoter of the cultural-artistic and social development project with COOPEMEP.
2008. La Casa Azul. Promoter of artistic and cultural events.
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