Felix Angel: Artist of Infinite Possibilities.

• Author: Casciero, Annick Sanjurjo
• Position: ART

Colombian artist Félix Ángel is currently the Director of the Cultural Center of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and the curator of its exhibits. He believes that "development is still on hold in Latin America because development is not just an economic problem, but rather a holistic problem that includes cultural issues." Through its visual arts programs, concerts, conferences, and cultural development programs, the IDB Cultural Center is focused on valuing, promoting, and publicizing Latin American and Caribbean cultural expressions in and outside of the hemisphere.

Ángel is a multi-faceted person who is interested in all socio-cultural expressions and is constantly trying to understand what is behind them. "I am a bit of a peculiar artist," he says. "Why? Because I do a little of everything in the field of Latin American plastic arts. I'm a painter, a draftsman, a printer, and a curator of exhibits, my own and others. I am also a critic and a writer." He has unusual energy, and perhaps because of this, it is difficult to separate his work as an artist from his work as a member of the artistic community.

Born in Medellín, Colombia, Félix Ángel graduated from the National University in 1974 with a degree in architecture. He then studied drawing for a year and pottery for two years. He also taught plastic arts at various institutions including the Colegio Mayor de Antioquia, el Instituto de Artes, and the School of Industrial Design at the Bolivarian Pontifical University.

After a while, his hometown began to feel a little small to him, so he set off in search of new horizons and went to Washington DC, a step that began a rich new phase in his life. lie started working at the Museum of Art of the Organization of American States (OAS) as an assistant to Director José Gómez Sicre. He began to design the temporary exhibits and later to curate them. He also worked as an assistant to critic and Latin American art historian Marta Traba reinstalling the permanent exhibit of the Museum's collection (1982).

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In 1989, however, Ángel decided it was time for a change of scenery, so he left the OAS and began a phase of travelling, creating, and organizing exhibits. Then in 1992, he was called to be an adviser to the IDB to help give shape to the recently created Cultural Center. Ángel was named director of the Center in 1999.

In spite of his many and varied activities in fields related to art, Félix Ángel continues to be...