Image: Museum of Latin American Art of Buenos Aires
Museum of Latin American Art of Buenos Aires, or MALBA, is presenting 'Abel Rodríguez / Mogaje Guihu: El árbol de la vida y la abundancia', an exhibition devoted to the Colombian Indigenous artist’s reconstruction of the Amazon rainforest from memory. The show opened on June 19, 2026, and is scheduled to run through August 23 on Level 1 of the museum in Buenos Aires.
The exhibition brings together a broad selection of Rodríguez’s work, described by MALBA as close to 500 pieces made in watercolor, tempera, ink and acrylic over roughly three decades. The museum says the drawings rebuild the Amazon “tree by tree and leaf by leaf,” turning remembered ecological knowledge into images of remarkable detail. The show’s title refers to the 'Árbol de la Abundancia', an image found in the cosmologies of many Indigenous peoples: a primordial tree from which all fruits emerged before an axe scattered its seeds across the world.
MALBA’s presentation situates Rodríguez as one of the most important figures in contemporary Latin American art and among the first Indigenous artists to enter the international art circuit. The artist, who signed his works with both his Indigenous name, Mogaje Guihu, and the name Abel Rodríguez, was born around 1941 in the Colombian Amazon near the Cahuinarí River and belonged to the Nonuya clan. According to the museum’s text, his formation as a 'sabedor' began in childhood, with training in the knowledge of plants, their practical and symbolic uses, and the relationships linking forest, animals, people and territory.
Rodríguez began drawing around the age of 40, after years of preserving and translating this knowledge through images. MALBA notes that he produced around 500 works over three decades and registered about 400 botanical species in the process. The museum also emphasizes the duality in his signature, reading it as a boundary between two worlds and a possibility of coexistence. Rodríguez died in Bogotá on April 9, 2025.
The exhibition is organized by the Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand, or MASP. Curators listed by MALBA are Adriano Pedrosa, MASP’s artistic director, and assistant curator Leandro Muniz. The museum says guided tours will be offered on Fridays at 5 pm, beginning June 22.
The exhibition appears alongside a busy MALBA program in July, but it occupies its own space as a stand-alone presentation on the museum’s Level 1. MALBA’s hours are Thursday through Monday from noon to 8 pm, and Wednesdays from 11 am to 8 pm; the museum is closed on Tuesdays. 'Abel Rodríguez / Mogaje Guihu: El árbol de la vida y la abundancia' remains on view until August 23, 2026.
