An Unfinished Place. Building Art Infrastructure in Central America brings together texts written by Virginia Pérez-Ratton over a period of fifteen years (between 1995 and 2009), many of which remained unpublished or have been difficult to access. The author dissects her own professional work, imparting her greatest expectations without reservation, and likewise her great sorrows and frustrations around arts administration. Her writings are affective and passionate. Pérez-Ratton’s perspective was one of an artist who nonetheless decided to be a museum’s director and a curator in order to radically change the conditions of art production of her own time.

Pérez-Ratton’s writings are affective, passionate, and assumes a firm stance over situations that she deems unnegotiable and urgent. It doesn’t come as a surprise that her opinions regarding what is the public responsibility of the curator and of institutions are still relevant today, demanding new responses from us. Originally written within the span of fifteen years (between 1995 and 2009), these texts are circulated here once more, inviting us to think about the dimensions of the difficult –and often misunderstood– labour of creating infrastructure, and of contributing to sustaining an artistic ecosystem.