At the beginning of the module, Victor gave us a series of sheets containing activities that we could carry out at the same time as our meetings. Regarding the visits to the exhibitions, we had a series of questions to answer:
What readings do the samples go through?
How do we link with the place of the sample?
What does it propose to us, or how is it situated in the context?
How has this work been generated?
And how are these questions applied to our work? What do we think of our artistic practices, the spaces where we have been linked and the audiences that look at our work?
The answers are obviously varied and personal. In my case, I could see that most of the exhibitions seek to subvert, in one way or another, the dominant convention of what is understood by the word "art", both in the themes that are represented, as well as in the processes and forms of production. Luis Hampshire tries to integrate the residues of his process into the final result of his work; Mónica Castillo (Textile Museum) opens the creation of work to the community, forming a group of women seamstresses and delegating decision-making regarding artistic solutions; the Yopes used the imaginary of the 1990s - a time when they were children or adolescents - as a subject of representation regarding the reflection of the present to produce art.
For me these are ways of doing and seeing the world, ways that I have not always considered, since for me art has been an exercise of a single person; in that sense, my link with the place of the samples is one of confrontation. I like what I saw, but the way they were made puts me out of my comfort zone. Nevertheless, I decide to open myself to the experience.
I've been thinking for some time about the things I don't do in my artistic practice, one of them is collaboration, openness. This diploma course has been a vehicle to try to integrate new ways of doing things, meet new people and generate professional relationships that contribute to my work, but also find a way to give back to all that. I must say I haven't found a way yet, but I hope to.
The spaces and the public where I have presented my work have been varied, private and institutional spaces, by call or by invitation. The exhibitions in which I have participated have been collective, so the profile of the public that sees my work is quite general. What are the places that identify with me and my work? Even though I have a statement, right now I feel like my identity as an artist hasn't been nurtured enough yet.
THURSDAY AND FRIDAY
The last two days were quiet, we reviewed the progress of the projects. In my case, I could say that the pre-production phase is almost finished and I only need to develop an idea to produce.
On the other hand, the group dynamics where I was paired with another artist, Delfina Alvarado, whose project also has the territory as one of its main axes. At the beginning of the week we established a dynamic where we were going to take records of the places where we went Tuesday and Wednesday; we take photographs, cartographic records, room texts, personal notes, etc.; In the end, we combined it to do a visual drift exercise about our week in the diploma course, which turned out quite well. I clarify that we did not establish as an objective to generate a "work of art", but rather an exercise that would help us to develop our own projects.
***
That's what I've been doing these last few weeks. In short: I have enough material to work with and a rough idea of what I want to say. We'll see how it works out.