Apollo11/Luna15

This work was part of Looking 101, a 2022 exhibition that supported Northwestern University’s undergraduate curriculum with an emphasis on first-year students. The following text was made available in the exhibition via cell phone camera (QR code) and booklet:

Fernando Bryce creates his ink-on-paper drawings using a systematic process that he describes as "mimetic analysis." First he culls archives for print materials like advertisements, newspaper articles, and propaganda pamphlets. Using a light table, Bryce then reproduces a selection of these materials in his own hand-drawn style, usually arranging them in order to examine the ways historical events have been represented in printed media.Bryce started using this method while studying in Berlin in 1997, when he discovered a 1930s propaganda packet by the Peruvian government and reproduced it. Much of his work continues to examine US-Latin American relations, colonialism, and Latin American politics. The two panels of Apollo 11/Luna 15 contain re-creations of newspaper headlines and advertisements in English and Spanish, primarily relating to the American Apollo 11 and Soviet Luna 15 space expeditions of 1969. An article entitled "Armstrong y Colón Juntos" (Armstrong and Columbus Together) draws the viewer to think about colonialism and the Cold War. Placed in the lower right corner like a footnote, a small headline reads AMERICA: Nixon Hará hoy una Rápida Visita a Vietnam del Sur (America: Today, Nixon Will Make a Quick Visit to South Vietnam), referring to the ongoing war in Vietnam.