Artist whose practice links to social participation processes related to education and collective knowledge, to which end he applies different knowledge-production and -organization methodologies, particularly tequio, an Indigenous collective work structure largely rooted in Oaxaca. He trained at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México’s school of art and design, in its Medios Múltiples seminar, and was artist-in-residence at the Jan van Eyck Academie in Maastricht. His work has been shown in collective exhibitions at Kunsthalle Bern, in Switzerland; the Museo Universitario de Art Contemporáneo and the Museo Tamayo, both in Mexico City; in addition to the Netherlands’ VanAbbe Museum. In 2022 Godínez Nivón won the Prince Claus Mentorship Award from the Prince Claus Fund & Goethe-Institut. That year also saw the artist represent Mexico at the 23rd Triennale di Milano’s international exhibition, where he came in at second place for best pavilion. He is currently a member of the Sistema Nacional de Creadores de Arte de México.

El sueño del oyamel, 2024
Video (black and white, sound)
17 min. 17 sec.

In collaboration with Leonor Ramírez, León Rodríguez, and the Hñähñü community of San Ildefonso Cieneguilla, Tierra Blanca, Guanajuato
Additional participants: Margarita García, J. Guadalupe Hernández Suarez, Dulce María Hernández Urias, Harif Emanuel Hernández Urias, Nadia Rodríguez Ramírez, Diana Urias Morales, Patricia Guadalupe Urias Morales, and Toribio Viñes Félix
Advisor: Edgar Pedro Méndez Vázquez, professor at Centro Interdisciplinario del Noreste de la Universidad de Guanajuato
Documentation and registration: Alena Kolesnikova
Photography and editing: Sergio Urcino
Registration and second camera: Alena Kolesnikova
Color correction: David Camargo and Sergio Urcino
Original music and sound design: Fernando Vigueras
Song: “Dya dehehū” (We Are Water)
Creators: Nadia Rodriguez Ramirez (däzabi) and Gabriel Ricardo de Dios Figueroa
Performers: Leonor Ramírez and Nadia Rodríguez
Direct Sound: Mauricio Orduña
Production and museography: Mirna Castro

Appealing to the power of the dreamlike, this video installation links ancestral wisdom and community action. Inspired by dreams that reflect the memory and aspirations of the earth itself, the film bears witness to the resilience that enables our interdependence with the nature that surrounds and sustains us. Through this project, a community reimagines and rebuilds its relationship with the “oyamels” (fir trees), while sowing a future for generations to come. 

Ojo de agua, 2024
Stone and cistern water
In collaboration with Harif Emanuel Hernández Urias

Ojo de agua is an artistic intervention in the Museo del Pueblo de Guanajuato’s historic cistern, which, for more than 200 years, has collected rainwater and seepage from an adjacent hill. This structure, which now houses and sustains a unique ecosystem of microorganisms, is transformed, thanks to the incorporation of a stone from the Sierra Gorda embedded with Cinco Llagas seeds. The Cinco Llagas plant has significant sacred importance to the Hñähñu people, and this artistic intervention seeks to release water from the cistern, creating a link between stagnant water and its natural cycles. The act reflects the deep interconnection between nature and culture by invoking a dialogue between the hill, the water, and the clouds.