Marilyn Boror

Courtesy of the artist

Marilyn Boror Bor (b. 1984, Guatemala) is a Mayan-Kaqchikel artist, curator, and educator based in Guatemala. She has a degree in Art from the University of San Carlos in Guatemala. Marilyn Boror Bor is known for her extensive use of materials and the deep social commitment of her artistic practice. Her work explores themes such as Indigenous identity, historical memory, colonialism, and resistance.

She has participated in numerous exhibitions around the world, such as the 35th São Paulo Biennial (Brazil, 2023); Bienal Sur (Buenos Aires, Argentina, 2022); the 19th, 20th, 22nd, and 23rd Bienal de Arte Paiz (Guatemala); La Bienal en Resistencia (Guatemala, 2018 and 2022); Bienal del Sur “Pueblos en resistencia” (Caracas, Venezuela, 2018). Boror's work has also been shown in Guatemala, Mexico City, Santiago de Chile, Buenos Aires, Barbados, Rio de Janeiro, São Paulo, Salvador De Bahia, Brasilia, Quito, Zurich, Munich, Berlin, Kuala Lumpur, London, and Central America. Her work is featured in Phaidon's Art Next Generation, a selection of some of the most innovative and interesting contemporary artists working across all media in the world. Some of her works are in the collections of the Reina Sofía Museum, Il Posto Santiago de Chile, Art Nexus Colombia, 25 hrs Hotel Switzerland, and private collections in Guatemala, Costa Rica, Malaysia, Germany, and Panama. Marilyn Boror Bor participated in LA ESCUELA___’s AULAS program, where she developed the project Escultura del alma [Souled Sculpture] (Ecuador, 2024).

A school without walls

LA ESCUELA___ began in 2021 with a reflection from its artistic director and co-founder, Miguel Braceli, about educational models for social practices and situated learning. This idea of bringing art and education closer to social realities by taking them out into public space became the building block of a project co-developed with the international foundation Siemens Stiftung. From this vision, LA ESCUELA___ was conceived as a “school without walls.”

Rather than operating from a fixed campus or following a predetermined curriculum, this artist-run platform works through a growing hemispheric network of artists, architects, educators, researchers, organizers, independent spaces, and communities. Its projects take shape in different contexts across the Americas, responding to local conditions while creating connections between places and practices.

Since 2022, LA ESCUELA___ has developed more than 45 projects in 13 countries, engaging more than 6,000 participants in online and on-site programs, and collaborating with over 350 artists and thinkers. Its programs include on-site experimental classrooms and online labs, residencies, public art, exhibitions, lectures, workshops, symposia, and research processes. An open-access Library with over 300 essays, interviews, documentation, and pedagogical resources expands this work into a growing alternative critical pensum of Latin American artistic and pedagogical practices.

At the heart of the platform is a commitment to reciprocal exchange: not exporting a model from one place to another, but creating conditions for different forms of knowledge to meet, circulate, and transform one another.