The work of Carlos Amorales (Mexico City, 1970) is primarily concerned with language, translation as a process of generating meaning, and the (im)possibility of communication through encoded or unrecognizable forms. Amorales operates at the boundaries of image and sign through various media, including animation, video, film, drawing, installation, performance, and sound. His practice is based on different forms of translation or derivation—a word-formation process that allows languages to designate concepts semantically related to others—and enables the artist to create works that are conceptually and formally linked to one another.

A significant portion of Amorales’ work is based on Archivo líquido (Liquid Archive) (1998–2010), a repository of around 4,000 vector drawings that the artist built from silhouettes of personal photographs, artistic documentation, and images found on the Internet, among other sources. The artist generated these vector images as content for animations, some of which are displayed in Room A, and also used them to create prints, paintings, and sculptures, some of which are featured in Room B. He conceived this image archive as an open-source tool to be used in diverse ways in art and culture.

Another project that emerged from this archive is Herramientas de trabajo (Tools for Work) (2010), a film in which a series of flat plastic figures, shaped like animals and humans, are intermittently thrown together into the camera’s field, suggesting visual narratives dictated by chance. These shapes were later materialized as drawing tools (graduated like squares or rulers) and were also used in other works present in the exhibition, demonstrating the unifying nature of this piece. This work, which lends its name to the exhibition, encapsulates the derivative process that characterizes Amorales’ practice: from the artist’s photographs came Archivo líquido; from that, the tools for drawing; from these, the film was created, and so on.

Through the lens of derivation, the works included in the exhibition are not just artworks; they also become tools that enable new works and processes. Carlos Amorales. Herramientas de trabajo is housed in Rooms A, B, and the Foundry Room at MAMM and is divided into three sections that group together three of the artist’s major interests: moving images, still images, and, in the Foundry Room, music. Without being a retrospective, the exhibition aims to showcase the artist’s varied and prolific career, as well as the elements that unify his work.