HOFFMANN’S HOUSE

(José Pablo Díaz / Rodrigo Vergara. Santiago, 1999)

Founded by artists José Pablo Díaz and Rodrigo Vergara in 1999 after purchasing a mediagua—a type of low-cost emergency social housing in Chile which provided the artists with an exhibition space—Hoffmann’s House has made a point of reflecting upon economic and professional precariousness in Chile. The work If I Can Make It Here, I Can Make It Anywhere was first presented at the exhibition Daniel López Show, held at the New York gallery Roebling Hall in 2007. The exhibition displayed 144 different applications to open bank accounts in the Banco de Chile, as manipulated by 72 Chilean artists. Daniel López was one of the pseudonyms used by Augusto Pinochet to open accounts at the U.S. entity Riggs Bank, thereby circumventing the Chilean tax system. The work questions the Banco de Chile’s involvement in these obscure transactions. Additionally, the bank account applications provided artists residing both in Chile and New York with mobile supports for their artworks as well as portable testimonies of the corrupt and discriminatory practices of financial institutions—both with regard to artists and to the overall population.