Pinto mi Raya began in 1990 as an artist's gallery, along with other similar alternative spaces promoted by artists of our generation (the one that started in the seventies and is known as the generation of The Groups), among them El Archivero and La Agencia, as well as others opened by younger artists such as La Quiñonera and el Salón des Aztecas.  The original address of our mini underground gallery was Sombrerete # 505, in colonia Condesa.

Our original goal was to have a place where  we could show fun, critical, process oriented work excluded from museums and commercial galleries. After a while, rather than giving the audience finished "art" products, we became interested in promoting interaction, which is one of the reasons why our selection criteria both for artists and projects we work with has always been inclusive. We are not interested in presenting the "truth", but in making things happen. We are also committed to collaboration.

This experience allowed us to detect some of the most serious problems in our art system, and little by little we started turning into a platform from which we could launch applied conceptual art projects* in order to try to find solutions for them.  In other words, we seek to lubricate the art system so it runs more smoothly.  We also decided to become nomads.

Pinto mi Raya is an independent project, but we are not fussy about working with other members of the art system.  It may not be a financially profitable project, but it allows us to have fun,  as much as when you toss a coin and, against all odds, it lands on its edge, its third face.

The following pages document the route Pinto mi Raya has followed.

*Applied conceptual art is a term we use to define the works that seek to alter reality in a practical way rather than seeking aesthetic or artistic values.

Monica Mayer y Victor Lerma