Mariana Wardwell

Associate Professor

Office/Studio

VAF 363

Biography

Mariana Razo Wardwell, also known professionally as Mariana Botey, is an art historian, curator, and artist from Mexico City. She serves as an Associate Professor of Latin American Modern and Contemporary Art in the Art History, Theory, and Criticism program at the University of California, San Diego. Botey earned her Ph.D. in Visual Studies, with an emphasis on Critical Theory, from the University of California, Irvine in 2010. Her work has greatly influenced the fields of Latin American art, decolonial studies, and indigenous visual culture, exploring themes of modernism, epistemic violence, and postcolonial conditions.

Botey’s book, Zonas de Disturbio: Espectros del México Indígena en la Modernidad (2014), is a landmark in the study of Mexican art, decolonial thought, and indigenous specters within modernity. Through this work, she has become a key figure in interdisciplinary scholarship, drawing connections across Art History, Film Theory, Visual Studies, Philosophy, and Ethnic Studies. Her research continues to shape discourse on how indigenous and subaltern perspectives disrupt conventional narratives in visual culture. She was the academic director of the Zonas de Disturbio seminar at the University Museum of Contemporary Art (MUAC) at UNAM, where she facilitated critical interdisciplinary dialogues from 2009 to 2011. Additionally, her tenure as a research fellow at CENIDIAP-INBA advanced critical research within Mexico’s National Center for the Documentation of Fine Arts.

Appointed by the Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes y Literatura in 2022, Botey took on the role of Creative Director, Co-curator, and Lead Researcher of the Mexican Pavilion at the 2023 Venice Biennale Architettura. Her collaboration with the architectural firm APRDLSP yielded Utopian Infrastructure: The Campesino Basketball Court, a project widely covered by media such as e-flux and ArchDaily. In 2023, she was commissioned by Mexico's Secretaría de Desarrollo Agrario, Territorial y Urbano (SEDATU) to lead the research and development of the Museo del Archivo Nacional Agrario, curating its collection and contributing original artwork to its exhibits.

As a founding member of the editorial committee of El Espectro Rojo since 2009, Botey has also played a major role in the Zona Crítica collection, a collaboration between Siglo XXI Editores, UNAM, and UAM. This committee has spearheaded impactful publications, exhibitions, and essays, examining Mexican cultural archives and national identities. Her scholarly publications cover an expansive range of topics, from Mexican modernism and ethnography to critiques of contemporary cultural extractivism.

Botey’s work in experimental film has been exhibited at prominent institutions such as the Cineteca Nacional in Mexico City, Guggenheim Museum in New York, and the Reina Sofia in Madrid. Her unique visual language draws from her research, using art as a form of political critique.

Her latest project involves a retrospective volume co-published by Siglo XXI Editores and Fondo de Cultura Económica, where she reflects on her career in film, art, and theory. This upcoming book will showcase her interdisciplinary approach to Latin American art, connecting her theoretical insights to her artistic practices. As a scholar and artist, Botey’s career embodies a commitment to postcolonial theory, indigenous perspectives, and social justice in the arts. She resides between San Diego and Mexico City, where she continues her prolific research and creative endeavors.