Valentín Salinas
Valentín Salinas (San Felipe, Chile, 1987) is a visual artist. His work explores memory, absence, and the symbolic dimension of everyday life. Through a painting practice built upon subtle material layers, glazes, and a particular interplay of light, half-light, and transparency, he transforms recognizable scenes and objects into images that evoke memory and reverie.
Initially trained as a painter and later in sculpture and architecture, he has developed a practice that brings together observation, memory, and spatial construction. His work has been presented in exhibitions and projects in Chile, Argentina, Mexico, and France.
His work seeks to make visible what remains in silence: a barely perceptible presence, a space charged with memory, an image suspended between the real and the imagined.
Selected Exhibitions
A selection of exhibitions and collaborative presentations developed in Chile and internationally, including projects in Argentina, Mexico, and France.
Memoria y Proyección — Galería Municipal, Valparaíso, Chile, 2025
Geomorfología de un viaje — Galería Municipal, Valparaíso, Chile, 2022
Jóvenes artistas de Aconcagua — Centro Patrimonial Buen Pastor, San Felipe, Chile, 2021
Retrospectiva — Galería Pierre Loti, Valparaíso, Chile, 2020
Entre frontières naturelles et artificielles — Le CAL, Clermont de l’Oise, France, 2019
Exposición Continua — Claraboya Atelier, Cerro Concepción, Valparaíso, Chile, 2014–2019
Reestructura — Valparaíso, Chile, 2017
8 sobre el Continente — 30º Festival Cultural, Zacatecas, Mexico, 2016
Co.iL. — Espacio Artístico Isidoro, Buenos Aires, Argentina, 2015
Metáfora sobre la Realidad — Valparaíso, Chile, 2015
Selected Projects
Trashumantes
2019–2022 · Aconcagua Territory, Central Chile
An independent multidisciplinary research project connecting archaeology, anthropology, and contemporary art. Developed through four expeditions across the territory associated with the Aconcagua culture, the project involved the documentation and georeferencing of ceremonial sites, petroglyphs, and ancient routes, followed by material research and the creation of four sculptures from dead wood collected and donated within the territory. The research culminated in the traveling exhibition Geomorfología de un viaje.
Cordilleras Invisibles
2020 · Central Chile
A field-based visual research project exploring landscape, territory, and invisible forms of cultural memory. Using infrared photography, the project investigated the Andes and coastal mountain ranges through a process of observation and expedition, taking the Selk’nam concept of “Invisible Mountain Ranges” as a poetic point of departure.
Entre frontières naturelles et artificielles
2019 · Chile–Argentina / Clermont de l’Oise, France
A research and artistic project examining migration, borders, and the construction of territory. Through experimental printmaking and the direct transfer of impressions from materials used to build or delimit spaces, the project investigated the physical and symbolic nature of borders. The research culminated in an exhibition at Le CAL in France.
Co.iL. — Latin American Traveling Collective
2015–2018
A collaborative artistic and research project bringing together ten artists from Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Venezuela. The collective developed a traveling programme of exhibitions and exchanges across Latin America, emphasizing collaboration, production, exhibition-making, and dialogue between different cultural and artistic contexts.
Claraboya Atelier
2014–2021 · Valparaíso, Chile
A space for artistic production, experimentation, exhibitions, and collaboration co-founded in Valparaíso. Over several years, Claraboya Atelier developed an ongoing exhibition programme and served as a platform for artistic exchange, independent production, and the presentation of contemporary practices.