Taking artists on a boat to a remote island in the South Pacific so they can work with marine biologists, environmental specialists, filmmakers and activists, in the middle of nowhere and with unexpected materials around them. This is the project developed by TBA21 Academy, a part of Francesca Thyssen-Bornemisza’s TBA21 Foundation, which adds to artistic production, research into this confluence of art and science so that art becomes an integral part of the process of critical thinking and seeking solutions related to the climate crisis, more specifically, in relation to the defence and conservation of the oceans.

The idea of ​​putting artists and scientists to work together is not new. In the late 1960s, Experiments in Art and Technology (E.A.T.) emerged, a non-profit initiative with the aim of developing collaborations between artists and engineers. In this way, artists expanded their role in society, contributing to exploring the limits of technological innovations and their impact on the individual. John Cage, Robert Rauschenberg and Öyvind Fahlström were some of the artists who participated in this programme, which reached its climax in the Pepsi Pavilion at the Osaka Fair in 1970.

A more recent example was seen in recent months at the Centre for Contemporary Culture in Barcelona, ​​where ten artistic projects emerged in the context of Art at CERN, a programme of residencies and production by artists at CERN (European Organisation for Nuclear Research) in Geneva. The exhibition Quantum presents a theme that is as fascinating as it is overwhelming, because it explores that which is invisible, not the reality that we see based on the information we have about it, but that which opens up several possibilities simultaneously. Quantum presents two itineraries, one artistic (with 10 proposals) and the other scientific (as an introduction to nine aspects derived from the research carried out at CERN), which intersect and complement each other.

Artistic and scientific methodologies share some aspects. Rigor and research, but also intuition and experimentation, are an essential part. They also share a less pleasant side: too often they tend to be identified, by the public opinion, with cryptic and inaccessible discourses and languages. A fact that is not without curiosity because, a priori, both explore crucial aspects for our present (and future!). Perhaps this is related to the fact that both practices have to do with the field of uncertainty and that the expansion of research is directly proportional to the number of new questions that are opened.

“Art and science are inextricably linked; both are ways of exploring existence, what it is to be human and what is our place in the universe,” said Rolf Hauer, director of CIERNE, recently, “both require technical mastery, and both try to explore the limits of human potential.”

[Article published in Bonart, 2019]

We live in turbulent times, to paraphrase the title of the exhibition with which the IVAM in Valencia commemorates its thirty years of existence. Ambiguous and unjust times, which follow a logic more appropriate to a dystopian novel than to the supportive and sustainable world in which we would like to live. As in the 1930s or the 1960s, it seems that we have no choice but to protest, to publicly show our rejection of situations or actions that are unjust or disproportionate, through marches, demonstrations, resistance, violent or peaceful actions, infiltrations, strikes, boycotts, critical articles, ironic tweets or #hashtags.

Art can also be a broad field of expression that is nourished by criticism and social commentary, activism or the proposal of alternatives. From the distribution of Coca-Cola bottles with the message “Yankees go home”, infiltrated by the artist Cildo Meireles, to the drawings of protests taken from the media by Rirkrit Tiravanija, passing through the posters and statistics of Guerrilla Girls, there have been many artists who have raised their voices against American interventionism, social injustices or inequality between men and women.

At the point where representation meets action, it is worth remembering the cases in which artists collect or collaborate with activists who successfully resolve their claims. Two examples: the videographic works of the Austrian Oliver Ressler, recently presented in an exhibition at the Angels Barcelona gallery, on actions by activist groups aimed at warning against climate change with the proposal of alternatives to stop the inevitable. This is the case of the multi-channel installation “Everything’s coming together while everything is falling apart” (2016-2018) which captures various actions such as the blockade of a power station in Germany or the community created after the blockade of the construction of an airport in France.

Another case is that of The Yes Men, a well-known group of American activists who on January 16 distributed a false/optimistic edition of The Washington Post, dated May 1, 2019, in which the news of Donald Trump’s resignation as president appeared on the front page, following the continuous protests carried out by women, and whose interior summarized the news that we would all like to be true: from #MeToo to Trump “You’re Fired”, the positive reaction of the international community, the end of injustices and the triumph of democracy. And, above all, the news appears to be the fake edition of the same newspaper that already predicted the events that are narrated in May 2019.

Change the imaginary and resist. Exercise our rights, vote to be able to change things. Protest and be proactive at the same time. Fight against injustice and, above all, do not conform.

A group of activists distributes “Bye Bye 45,” a satirical edition of The Washington Post. Photograph: Tasos Katopodis/Getty Images for Yes Labs

[Artice published in Bonart, 2019]

Cloud Atlas is a wonderful film by the Wachowski sisters in which stories and characters unfold, mix and meet again across time, races and genders (sexual and film). The concept of trans is a notion that goes far beyond gender and has to do with the flow and transit between identities, formats, politics, languages ​​or disciplines. Transit, transition, transformation.

The exhibition dedicated to Lorenza Böttner, curated by Paul B. Preciado at the Virreina is an example of the recovery of an exceptional artist who made transformation her strategy to express her point of view and to define her own identity. A documentary by Michael Stahlberg brings us closer to the personal circumstances of Ernst Lorenz Böttner, who at the age of eight is the victim of an accident after climbing a tree and grabbing onto a high-tension cable that results in the amputation of both arms. After her rehabilitation and refusal to assume a bodily standard through prosthetics, she was then able to explore through art a form of expression and her own identity, which included the transformation of her face through painting, of her feminine personality, Lorenza, and of her performance abilities. A student of Professor Harry Kramer at the Gesamthochschule in Kassel (how important is the role of a teacher, a tutor who knows how to point out the potential of his students without imposing himself!), she uses her circumstances and a very conscious exhibitionism as a means of expression to break away from the pigeonholing to which people with some kind of bodily dysfunction are subjected.

Lorenza Böttner paints with her feet and mouth, dances, performs, uses her face as a canvas, paints in the street, investigates and studies the notion of “freak”, is a model for photographers such as Joel-Peter Witkin or Robert Mapplethorpe, embodies classical models such as the Venus de Milo to highlight the canons of beauty of a mutilated body and travels the world. The exhibition does not focus particularly on her later years (her role as inspiration for Petra, the mascot created by Mariscal for the 1992 Barcelona Paralympic Games, or her early death due to complications from AIDS), but rather emphasises the celebration of idiosyncrasy and of an individual and differentiated expressiveness that reminds us of the meaning of trans: the freedom to define oneself, to invent and reinvent oneself, to express and present oneself freely and autonomously, outside (or against) pre-established standards. Trans means dialogue, confrontation, fluidity, tolerance. And, indirectly, it also reminds us that the 21st century, in all its complexity, will be trans or is in danger of being retrograde to limits that we will not be able to withstand.

[Article published in Bonart, 2019]

References, debts, homages, quotes, copies, plagiarism, remixes, cut-and-paste… Culture is always the result of mixtures, rewritings, contaminations and updates. Ideas appear and reappear again and again over time. Contexts and circumstances change and, with them, readings and interpretations.

All of this is what Falsestuff is about, the play, written, directed and performed (among others) by the Nao Albet / Marcel Borràs duo and presented at the Grec Festival last summer. Starting from the idea of ​​falsehood and authenticity in art/theater, it speaks of the fine line that separates the quote, homage and plagiarism and the complexity of the concept of authorship: Roland Barthes’ idea that a text does not belong to its author, but to culture and readers. In a game of formats and a dizzying pace, Falsestuff is not a typical play. In fact, it is several plays in one. It is Central European theatre, it is a comedy of art, it is a Western, it is silent film, it is music, it is a performance, it is a post-show discussion, it is a concert, it is a live performance, it is Tarantino, it is Falstaff and also falsestuff. It is, of course, F for Fake, the documentary about Orson Welles’ fraud and forgeries.
Pedro Azara (incidentally, curator of the Catalan Pavilion at the next edition of the Venice Biennale) explains in the post-show discussion (actually a theatrical discussion during the intermission of the performance) that in the past, copies of the most important archaeological discoveries were usually made, and it was these copies that were exhibited. In Falsestuff, the protagonist, André Féikiévich, is so methodical in his falsification of works of art that he needs to capture their essence in order to be able to falsify them. It is not strange that he sets himself new challenges and moves on to the falsification of plays. Is it possible to falsify plays? The actors, the company, even their behaviour in private? Does this meticulous reconstruction make sense? And from there, to the next question is a step: does the enormous effort that creation sometimes implies make sense? If we follow this line of thought, we go through the “uselessness” of art, the unproductive efforts and the “I would rather not do it” of Bartleby and of all the “artists of no”…
Tricks, fraud, lies. “Who cares about the facts?” asks Orson Welles in F for Fake. “Art is a lie that allows us to see the truth,” as Picasso said, as Welles says, as Féikiévich says, as Albet/Borràs say.
It is time to rethink formats. Or to have them all present and mix them. It is the cut-and-paste of Burroughs and also that of Bowie. Hybrids and transdisciplinarity as a conceptual decision. Being free to be able to move between ideas, formats and references. Be free to not be afraid of the weight of the past and also to not take yourself too seriously.

[Article published in Bonart, 2018]

Referències, deutes, homenatges, cites, còpies, plagis, remixes, cut-and-paste… La cultura sempre és fruit de barreges i reescriptures, contaminacions i actualitzacions. Les idees apareixen i tornen a aparèixer un i un altre cop en el temps. Canvien els contextos i les circumstàncies i, amb elles, les lectures i interpretacions.

De tot això va Falsestuff, l’obra teatral escrita, dirigida i interpretada (entre altres) pel tàndem Nao Albert/ Marcel Borràs i presentada al Festival Grec del passat estiu. A partir de la idea de falsedat i autenticitat en art/teatre es parla de la fina línia que separa la cita, de l’homenatge i el plagi i de la complexitat del concepte d’autoria: la idea de Roland Barthes de que un text no pertany al seu autor, sinó a la cultura i als lectors. En un joc de formats i un ritme de vertigen, Falsestuff no és una obra de teatre a l’ús. De fet, són vàries obres en una. És teatre centreeuropeu, és comèdia del arte, és Western, és cinema mut, és música, és performance, és col·loqui post-funció, és concert, és directe, és Tarantino, és Falstaff i també “falsestuff”. És, naturalment,
F for Fake, el documental sobre el frau y les falsificacions d’Orson Welles.

Explica Pedro Azara (per cert, comissari del Pavelló Català en la propera edició de la Biennal de Venècia) en el col·loqui post-funció (en realitat, un col·loqui teatralitzat a l’entreacte) que en el passat s’acostumava a fer còpies de les troballes arqueològiques més importants i eren aquestes còpies les que s’exhibien. A Falsestuff, el protagonista, André Féikiévich és tan metòdic en la seva falsificació d’obres d’art que necessita capturar la seva essència per tal de poder-les falsificar. No és estrany que es plantegi nous reptes i es passi a la falsificació d’obres de teatre. És possible falsificar una obra de teatre? Els actors, la companyia, fins i tot el seu comportament en privat? Té sentit aquesta minuciosa reconstrucció? I d’aquí a la següent pregunta hi ha un pas: té sentit el gran esforç que implica de vegades la creació? Si seguim aquesta línia de pensament passem per la “inutilitat” de l’art, els esforços improductius i el “preferiria no fer-ho” de Bartleby i de tots “els artistes del no”…

Trucs, fraus, mentides. “A qui li importen els fets?” es pregunta Orson Welles a F for Fake. “L’art és una mentida que ens permet veure la veritat”, deia Picasso, diu Welles, diu Féikiévich, diuen Albet/Borràs.

És temps de repensar formats. O tenir-los tots presents i barrejar-los. És el
cut-and-paste de Burroughs i també el de Bowie. Híbrids i transdisciplinarietat com a decisió conceptual. Ser lliures per poder transitar idees, formats i referents. Ser lliures per no tenir por al pes del passat i també per a no prendre’s massa seriosament.

I remember that in the 1990s there were works that explored the body and exposed it in all its vulnerability. I remember sculptures and installations that were displayed in all their fragility, such as the light bulbs or the piles of sweets by Félix González-Torres, who shared empathy and loss with the spectators. One century was ending and another was beginning with all the uncertainties and transformations that we could not even imagine at the time. Surely in the last twenty years there have been more changes in the way we work, move and relate to each other than in the entire previous century.

We are in 2018 and some of the artists of the 1990s are still references for other artists who had just been born then. Artists from the first decades of the 21st century who share with their predecessors a feeling that the world is changing in a direction contrary to any constructive logic. This uncertainty, helplessness, but also resistance and common sense, authenticity and return to the essential is very present in a way of working that generates proposals based on orality, on the transmission of stories and the use of the voice as an artistic object, in the shared experiences of projects that endure as memory or as a record, in exhibitions that explore what makes us vulnerable, the fragility of structures and, at the same time, their potential.

Six examples are better than a thousand theories: Lúa Coderch works with the voice, “the first material, the most available”, with hypnotic and precise narrations that focus on the minimum, on the infra-mince. Anna Dot explores the limitation of language and communication, the notion of translation, focusing on the minimum nuances, twists and repetitions that end up distorting the meaning. Enric Farrés-Duran tells stories in which the real and the fictional end up meeting and modifying each other. Research, coincidences and chance encounters allow her to create stories based on unexpected connections. Irina Mutt curates exhibitions that discuss hardness and resistance, fragility and vulnerability as non-antagonistic notions, affections and feelings, protecting oneself and protecting others. The exhibition A break can be what we are aiming for includes an inflatable installation made of various plastic materials (Dream Castles by Mycket) and works that put the body and structures in conflict (Moat by Laia Estruch).

If the artists who worked in the 90s emphasized fragility and impossibility, the artists born in the 80s and 90s are well aware of where they speak from and what tools they have at their disposal, what they can expect (or not) from institutions, the globality and instability of the world in which they live and also the immense potential of individuals.

Images from the exhibition “A break can be what we are aiming for”, curated by Irina Mutt at La Capella in Barcelona. Views of the installations Dream Castles by Mycket and Moat by Laia Estruch.
Photographs: Pep Herrero

[Article published in Bonart, 2018]

The hegemonic, Eurocentric and patriarchal vision of the world has long been dismantled. The art history we studied in the 20th century has been called into question, precisely because it excludes the multiple narratives that were simultaneously generated from non-Western cultures and geographies. We live in a world that is still hierarchical, but in which, at the same time, there are channels for making peripheral, transversal and diverse voices and views heard. Knowledge is no longer transmitted, but has multiple levels and is generated in a collective and de-hierarchical manner, based on doubt, tensions, contradictions and rereadings.

In this context, museums can no longer be the guardians of the treasures of the past, but rather great archives, repositories of memory (following Walter Benjamin) whose collections change, evolve, emphasize complexity and open up to multiple readings. A good example of this was the exhibition La caja entropica by Francesc Torres at the MNAC, which was based on the museum’s collection, understood as an archive in which it is possible to investigate what has been rejected, what is archived but left aside, in order to offer a portrait of a given moment, as faithful as official history.

The emphasis on critical and peripheral positions, the recovery of forgotten or silenced narratives or rereadings of history, with the consequent creation of new maps, generates new networks of connections based on alternative, multiple and simultaneous narratives, which allow Barcelona to be connected with, for example, Abu Dhabi or Guatemala City. Thus, in the exhibition From Barcelona to Abu Dhabi (co-organised by MACBA and ADMAF, Abu Dhabi) we rediscover the photographs of the Emirati artist Ebtisam Abdul Aziz in which a female figure appears, dressed entirely in black (including the head and face) contorting inside a white ring that prevents her from moving freely, evidencing the conflict and the effort of women in the United Arab Emirates (and in the world, in general) to overcome the social limitations imposed. From Guatemala, Cuerpo sobrevuelto by Nora Pérez photographs women’s bodies that overflow (literally) the restrictions that girdles try to impose by following imposed physical and beauty canons. Completing this peripheral tour, in One Year Women’s Performance. 2015-2016, recently exhibited at the Virreina, Raquel Friera is based on the action of the Taiwanese Tehching Hsieh in which he clocked in every day for a year, in an attempt, naturally unsuccessful, to quantify artistic work. Friera asks a series of women to sign and photograph themselves every time they finish domestic tasks or care for family members, precisely to make them visible.

In short, three examples from geographically distant contexts, which share views and artistic discourses on the role of women in very diverse societies.

[Article published in Bonart, 2018]

Article in A*DESK

Every time I visit ARCO (or any other art fair) I can’t help but think about the difficult role of galleries at a time when artists, institutions, critics, curators and even collectors have long since redefined their roles. In a recent conversation, a German gallerist recalled how, in the 1990s, institutions and the market followed two parallel paths, with occasional exchanges. Right now, not only are they absolutely interconnected, but all too often, fairs and biennials end up exchanging roles. On the one hand, with artists’ projects that are shown at biennials, supported, financed and managed by powerful galleries with an influence and visibility in the market that few fair stands can offer. And, on the other hand, we also see the opposite path, curated programs at fairs, which become another workspace for independent curators, stars of this new social class of cultural precariats.

But if each fair has its own idiosyncrasy, ARCO has even more so, because it was born in Spain in the 1980s, a context and a moment of “modernisation of the country” (which we now see was not so much) and which has played a role in introducing contemporary art, creating a market, educating new professionals and being a meeting place (professional, social and fun – in that respect Madrid always has a lot to offer).

ARCO 2018 continues to promote this aspect of an indisputable meeting place that goes beyond the fair itself, with closed-door work sessions between heads of institutions and with debates and presentations open to the general public. In that sense, it is exhausting. Like a speed date, the gallery owners try to explain in a synthetic way the complexity of works that are impossible to get into in a few seconds. But, in reality, that is our present, an accumulation of inputs, images, ideas, news, novelties and events to which we often cannot devote more than a few minutes or a quick reading of headlines.

That said, the truth is that ARCO 2018 is not a loud or noisy edition, on the contrary, there is a certain moderation in the works presented and everything is very measured and ordered. While the spectacular and “unlimited” stands are left for Basel, at ARCO there are accessible works, in terms of size and also in terms of price. In its quest to find its place in the competitive world of fairs, ARCO has long been betting on future values, emergencies and curated spaces.

The future is precisely the guest country this year. Well, it is not exactly like that, but it does occupy a central and elevated space, designed by Andrés Jaque, in which the curators Chus Martínez, Rosa Lleó and Elise Lammer have commissioned new works from 19 artists. In a green space reminiscent of artificial grass where you can relax or play, but also of a chroma green, where you can project whatever you want, the artists show not just a future, but a present that would be worth projecting into the future. In the antipodes of Black Mirror, the works of Regina Giménez, Eva Fàbregas, Teresa Solar or Július Koller, among others, speak of nomadism, DIY, intergenerational relationships, sustainability, survival and creativity. And indirectly they speak of the need for the existence of art itself as a space of freedom if we really want a future to exist.

But we remain in the present and the tour of ARCO always brings gratifying moments. Here are some in a disordered way: the musical moments in Hauser & Wirth, courtesy of Dan Graham; the installation Extra in which Candice Breitz plays the role of Kow; Momu & No Es (Joey Ramone), the humanistic-scientific approach by Pep Vidal in ADN gallery and in Lmno; the inventory of elements of a woman’s wardrobe by Hans-Peter Feldmann (ProjecteSD); the comics that expand in the space of Francesc Ruiz (Estrany- de la Mota), the body-space relationships of Sigurdur Gudmundsson or the relatives of Ragnar Kjartansson (i8) or “the paintings made by others” by Ryan Gander in Esther Schipper and by Enric Farrés Duran in noguerasblanchard; among many others.

But ARCO is not an impregnable bubble and the controversy and irritation of the present have also crept into the fair, even before it opened. The controversy created by the withdrawal of Santiago Sierra’s work “Political Prisoners in Contemporary Spain” is a symptom of a here and now in which freedom of expression is being violated and, what is worse, the denunciation of this fact can even be annoying or tiresome for many. The reality is much crueler because what is being dismantled is the recognition of human rights that cost so much to achieve. For some time now, no one has appeared in the controversial ARCO photo in the media. A work by Eugenio Merino, who, I believe, has produced the most faithful portrait of our present this year.