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emic/etic
24 OCT, 2024 – 29 MAR, 2025
Artists: Moisés Barrios, Dinorah Carballo, Darío Escobar, Joscelyn Gardner, Andrés Murillo, Virginia Pérez-Ratton, Christian Salablanca, Emma Segura y Sofía Ureña.
Curatorial support: Lola Malavasi L.
INFORMATION
ARTISTS: Moisés Barrios, Dinorah Carballo, Darío Escobar, Joscelyn Gardner, Andrés Murillo, Virginia Pérez-Ratton, Christian Salablanca, Emma Segura, Sofía Ureña.
SALAS: Lado V
“Emic: a description of the studied culture from the perspective of a member of the culture or insider”.
“Etic: a description of the studied culture from the perspective of an observer or outsider”.
I imagine curatorial practice as an exercise in anthropology in which, as a participant observer, I enter the space of the other from a place of listening and documentation. In this fiction, I position myself as an external agent to closely follow the creative processes of Andrés, Sofía, Emma, and Christian. The following will be the first words of a kind of anthropological log where observations will be documented.
September 14, 2024
I invite the group to enter into a dialogue with works from the Virginia Pérez-Ratton Collection as a pretext for each participant to propose a project of their own and for the curator to investigate the methodologies that unfold in the process— those that in their repetition become almost rituals.
To initiate this dialogue, I proposed a game that consists of approaching a pre-selected group of artworks in three rounds. In the first round, they selected a work based solely on an image of it. In the second round, I provided the name of the artist, the year, and the materials. In the last round, I shared with them a bit of the context and the concept of the artworks they selected. After each round, they could keep the artwork, or exchange it for another. At the end of the three rounds, only one of the artists decided to work with an artwork other than the one she had initially selected.
Andrés Murillo in dialogue with Banana ArtNews (1997) by Moisés Barrios and Vasito McDonald’s (1999) by Darío Escobar.ç
Note: He chose works that anger him, he is at odds with the tropical. However, this type of art is more accessible to him than most contemporary works.
Christian Salablanca in dialogue with Joscelyn Gardner’s Seno protegido (1997).
Note: He is struck by the type of materials, which look like those of a nest.
Emma Segura in dialogue with Hoja de vida (1995) by Virginia Pérez-Ratton.
Note: Wants to work with coat hangers. She already knew that the work was by Virginia but did not know more details.
Sofía Ureña in dialogue with Protocosmetógrafo interior (2003) by Dinorah Carballo.
Note: She was the only one who changed the work she had initially chosen. This one reminds her of objects she had or used, there is a closeness with the materials and the form.
October 24, 2024
(Written a priori from the conjecture of how the beginning of the work in situ could be experienced)
We prepared ourselves to start as we almost always have— from our concerns and with the daily routine of doing. The most valuable thing is the group’s willingness to allow me to walk with them on the path they constantly trace and retrace when facing an artistic project. They will be my guides, but also the objects of my study. In this double role, we will work from the contradictions that arise when we attempt to question the curatorial practice’s traditional perspectives.
In this way, an exhibition, work, and joint research space will be configured simultaneously. Each room will preserve the artwork along with the traces of conversations, connections, and explorations proposed during the shared time. In this journey we accompany each other to meet at a middle point, building a third symbolic and physical space from the constant dialogue. These conversations have not occurred yet, but they will nurture this whole exchange and contribute to shaping the material result that will be exhibited in the rooms. Although not yet defined, this place of intersections will be a space of study that will hopefully lead to other questions, debates, experiments, and, ideally, bring different practices closer.
…
To be continued.
Lola Malavasi L.
San José, October, 2024
This post is also available in: Español (Spanish)