Based in Santiago, Chile, Isabel Croxatto founded her eponymous gallery after more than three decades of directing her own dance company and pursuing choreographic and performance research. That background continues to inform how she approaches the gallery: not as a showroom for artworks, but as a space where artists, audiences, and architecture enter into dialogue. Centered on her signature “Living with Art” philosophy, the gallery has grown into a platform for developing long-term international careers for Chilean and Latin American artists.
We caught up with Croxatto to learn more about how her past work informs her present endeavors, as well as what she envisions for the future of the Latin American art market.
Isabel Croxatto. Photo: Carlos Saavedra. Courtesy of Isabel Croxatto Galería.
You founded the gallery after decades in choreography and performance research—how has that background informed or influenced your vision for the gallery?
For many years, my choreographic and performance research revolved around a single question: How does a body leave an inscription in the world? Founding a gallery did not mean leaving that question behind, but discovering another way of asking it through painting, textiles, sculpture, photography, and other artistic practices.
Dance taught me to think relationally. After more than three decades directing my own company, I came to understand that lasting cultural projects are built through trust, collaboration, and long-term commitment.
That experience continues to shape the gallery. I see exhibitions not as collections of artworks, but as spaces where artists, artworks, architecture, and audiences enter into dialogue. In many ways, I am still choreographing. The medium has changed—from bodies and movement to exhibitions and encounters—but the underlying question remains the same.
Nelson Hernández, Spinario II (2026). Courtesy of Isabel Croxatto Galería.
Can you outline for us your “Living with Art” concept?
For me, “Living with Art” was never a slogan; it was the founding premise of the gallery.
I believe art quietly reshapes the way we perceive and make sense of the world. I wanted to create a different way of experiencing contemporary art—one in which artworks become part of everyday life, and encounters between artists, audiences, and collectors unfold in a more intimate and meaningful way. That is why the gallery was born in my own home. It was not simply a practical decision, but a conceptual one.
For me, collecting is not the end of a relationship with an artwork; it is the beginning. “Living with Art” continues to shape our exhibitions, public programs, and the relationships we cultivate with artists and collectors. More than a gallery model, it offers a way of life shaped by art.
What is the ICG International Positioning Program? What inspired you to develop this project?
The ICG International Positioning Program emerged from nearly two years of reflecting on our own model as a gallery—its strengths, its limitations, and where we believed we could make the greatest impact. Rather than asking simply how to grow, we asked a more fundamental question: how can a gallery working from Chile contribute meaningfully to the international development of the artists it represents?
Working from Chile has taught us that the question is not how to do more, but how to do better. Meaningful international careers are built through continuity, not isolated opportunities. An art fair, a museum exhibition, or a residency can be transformative, but only when it forms part of a broader trajectory.
The program concentrates our resources on a carefully selected group of artists, building long-term international positioning strategies and the curatorial, institutional, editorial, and market conditions in which their practices can take root and endure.
Paloma Castillo, David (2026). Courtesy of Isabel Croxatto Galería.
Looking at the Chilean and Latin American art scenes today, what conversations or market shifts excite you the most? And where do you see your artists fitting into broader international dialogues?
What excites me most is not simply that Latin American artists are receiving greater international attention, but that the art world is becoming increasingly open to practices that bring original perspectives to shared contemporary questions. Artists are valued not simply for where they come from, but for the ideas they bring into the conversation.
Living and working in Chile inevitably shapes the way we look at the world. Ours is a long, narrow country, framed by the Andes and the Pacific, marked by deserts, volcanoes, forests, glaciers, and earthquakes, while remaining outside many of the established circuits of the international art world. What has often been seen as a disadvantage, I have come to understand as a particular vantage point.
I often think of the Atacama Desert. With the slightest rain, it suddenly bursts into bloom. I see something similar in Chilean art: from seemingly unlikely conditions emerge practices of remarkable originality. What these artists need is not validation alone, but sustained opportunities to take their place in the global conversation. That is where I see the role of our gallery.
Joaquín Reyes. Courtesy of Isabel Croxatto Galería.
You have several ambitious projects in the pipeline. Can you tell us a bit about them?
In many ways, the projects we are currently developing tell the story of the kind of gallery we want to build. They span very different moments in an artist’s career—from a first exhibition after art school to a major museum retrospective.
One of our most significant initiatives is “La Jaula Invisible,” the first museum retrospective dedicated to Víctor Castillo, developed over the past four years in partnership with the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes in Santiago. It brings together more than three decades of his work, offering the first comprehensive institutional survey of an artist whose practice has largely developed abroad.
Alongside this, we continue POSTESCUELA with Universidad Diego Portales and present “Dejar Atrás,” Joaquín Reyes’s second solo exhibition with the gallery. Together, these projects reflect our commitment to supporting artists at every stage of their careers and expanding our own understanding of what a gallery can be.
Learn more about Isabel Croxatto Galería, Santiago, here.