-I was able to visit your most recent exhibition, “Contado Estrellas”, here in London at Gazelli Art House. Why did you use this title for your exhibition?
– Contando estrellas means counting stars. You know when you find yourself at night, looking at the sky and watching those lights that are shinning in the darkness? There are different levels of perception.
Stars are a powerful symbol. The universe to us is unknown. At the same time stars, are a tool that men have used since the beginning of humanity. They are a tool to find our path and understand our geographical position. Holding the memory of those before us, stars all look the same from far away yet; in reality, each one is unique, just like us.The whole show commences with this idea.
I compare each artwork, which is an experience, to a star. In the show, the spectator walks inside my personal mythology and enters their own skull.
sin tiempo, 2017
variable
7’54’’ 4k sound
-From the 11th September last year until this 14th of November, Galleria Continua in San Gimignano ( Tuscany ), has hosted an artistic collaboration between you and Kiki Smith. Why did you choose to collaborate with her, and what was the meeting point from which your artistic comparison began?
-Because of affinity. This was my email to her:
Dear Kiki,
When I first met you, I was instantly struck. We were at Continua, in the garden. It was after dawn, your back covered with tattoos, those small stars inked indelibly on the surface of your skin resembled – to my eye – those bright summer nights where the stars gleaming upon us on the sky are too many to count.
I, too, have several constellations tattooed on my shoulders; I love the idea of sharing something as peculiar as that with you. That night everyone wanted to say hi to you; I stood by, somehow, feeling like I had already met you.
-“Effectively, I feel like a painter, if I must define myself”, you once declared. Painting was your first medium for artistic exploration. Do you find you can still define yourself as a painter, even now?
-Painter, sculptor, photographer are all categories relatively meaningless to me.
To me, art is a vision; that is it. The way you create the body of that vision is not so important to me. Of course, there are different approaches and methods to perceive reality. Because of that, I can say that I watch the world as a painter.
autoritratto
50 x 50cm
Cibachrome
Flashback, 2019
30 x 22.5cm
Glicee print on cotton paper, Dibond, framed
EUR 3,500
-How and when did you become an artist?
-I am not sure if one can become an artist. I can’t designate a moment. A when or how. To me, being an artist is a condition. A condition that, of course, must be protected and fed.
-How would you wish an audience to approach your work?
-I wish the audience approached my work with curiosity and humility. In reality, I wish everyone approached life in the same way.
-What message do you wish or aim to convey through your art and your work?
-I don’t have a message. I only have my experience to share. I am simply leaving my trace, just like cavemen did. Painting their hands on rocks, engraving what was essential to them.
-What significance does time have in your life and in your artistic practice?
-Time is such a complicated aspect of both life and art.
It goes by. It is almost a platform, a tool that keeps changing in terms of space and amount. That’s why I feel it is important to mark some steps along the way. The perception of it, the contractions, or expansions are so powerful. Before the pandemic, I was constantly traveling. Time was a sort of abstract concept; I didn’t have much time. I had to do this and that, back to back from a place to another. Then, being confined at home for such a long time made me think and understand that I lost so much time in other aspects of my life. It is cruel. Maybe time is cruel. It has no mercy. Can I have it back or have more? And what about your beloved’s time?
Poltrona, 2002
126 x 153.5cm
c-print, dibond, frame
-What meaning do you associate to light within your work?
-Indeed light is a material. It can reveal or hide things. It shapes reality. The experience of light or its absence is so powerful, a symbol, a myth.
The meaning is not there, at least not on the surface, the viewer’s perception is the mixture and collection of data and memories, and the result is personal meaning.
-After both a personal and artistic evolution, which of these mediums do you find yourself most at ease with at the moment: photography, video, installation or incisions?
-As I said before, the artwork is a vision. The vision is the result of an experience. The experience is linked to many factors. Seemingly at the moment, I love building installations. My solo shows are always a whole. All of them, even when constructed of: photos, objects, signs, engravings, and sculptures.
The body, the idea, is always more complex. Each piece of art is a word, each show, a sentence.
-You are a traveller: In what place do you prefer to spend your time?
-In business class, if I get an upgrade. I’m just kidding. Actually, I love to reach places where I have already been. I love seeing if they are still as I remember. I like to have my rituals, even if I am on the other side of the globe.
Of course, I love discovering new places, but I also love to feel at home in Beijing or CapeTown, having a favorite table in a restaurant in Paris, or being remembered as a client in a book store in Rome.
-What stuck by a statement you made a few years age: “i have no strategy if not to carry on doing what i fell..”. Does this still ring true? Do you have any future plan?
-It does, powerfully. I don’t know if it is a lack of capacity or an endless resource.
Art is everything to me; I owe everything to art.
I carry a debt, towards art, that I will never be able to repay; I can only keep doing what I feel, with trust. That is the only way I can attempt to pay back that debt.
Strategies are for creatives and advertising agents.
solamente tu ed io, 2017
150 x 216cm
Giclée Print on cotton paper, Dibond, frame
USD 1,020
sin tiempo, 2017
variable
7’54’’ 4k sound
