I could not found anything better to introduce myself into this open blog around + about the Ultrabarroc exhibition at the Grey Area symposium.
My dialogue is with Heleno Bernardi, a Brazilian artist, from Ouro Fino in Minas, who lives in Rio de Janeiro.
The image I attached shows the piece “The Narrow Gap Which Separates Amiability from Satiety” from the Chafes series Nocturne at Klabin Home (Foundation) in Rio de Janeiro.
This piece was made in Portugal and has travel to Brazil to “colonized” the house of Eva or to be colonized by Klabin Bedroom… “this type of projects, which has got to do with the occupation of a house which had been used and inhabited by other people, puzzles me…..it is fascinating to be able to put pieces of contemporary art in a habitat marked by people, where their sores are present; their small injuries were left behind. These small fissures are present in the landscape, not in a way in which they seem to be contemporary art neither by any form of contrast.. However. On the other way around, using the language nearly mimetic, in which the things which had already been there seem new and got integrated in it: a mimetism with landscape of the time” *
“Eva Klabin’s Bedroom impresses by its magnificence and aristocratic refinement. The decoration is light containing a smaller number of pieces that the other rooms of the house, and the ash-bluish shade of the walls creates a sensation of restfulness. The imposing gold bed from Italian Baroque was strategically placed at the centre of the room, and immediately attracts the attention of whoever enters it. In front of the bed, we see the tapestry card Boys Fishing, by Italian Giovanni Francesco Romanelli (17th century), that Eva Klabin liked to appreciated when she woke up, around 4 pm.”**
“Eva Klabin was born in S.Paulo, her parents were Lithuanian immigrants of Jewish descent, which arrived in Brazil at the end of the 19th century, as so many other immigrants fleeing from Europe in search of a new life.”** and, I can not found a better example of someone who has colonize and have been colonized throughout so many places and cultures. Her home, who now became a Foundation shows her fantastic collection of objects that she took from all over the places she lived and travelled.
As mention on the catalogue of her foundation:
“The art works held at this museum are intimately connected to a perspective that is both universal and personal, of whom created it during her life and destined it as a permanent collection of the city of Rio de Janeiro and of Brazil.”**
“Eva Klabin’s life only has a meaning for us, today, because she left this collection gathered in the house where she chose to live. Eva Klabin knew that her house, when transformed into a museum, would be a metaphor for her existence.”**
We all travel. We all colonize. We all contaminate places. Ambiences. People. Its is part of our nature to colonize and to be colonized, we can’t avoid it.
I love this tangent border where we stay, still in our privacy…so close to the outside world.
This iron. Black. Heavy and light piece, it floats on this chaise long, has “she” belongs to this place since always, even if it is a totally stranger, it belongs, it is part of. It shows our strengths and our vulnerability.
That encounter translates that tangent line. That encounter that we can not understand if it is natural or forced. That encounter emphasise the dichotomy of being together and being alone.
I like the masculine and the feminine side of the sculpture.
Eva Klabin was living permanently at night. Sleeping day time and doing all her duties during the evening and along the night. Organizing all her encounters after 1,2, or 3 am.
Well here I am, feeling so close, it is almost five and I have being doing through the night everything I could not find the way and the possibility of doing during the past day.
I like the quietness, the silence, the night rumours, the solitude, the nocturne side… thankfull to Rui work and words for helping me to translate my thoughts and introduce myself to this blog and to Heleno Bernardi!…in order to be colonized and to colonize.
Cristina
* Rui Chafes , Breathing Project, Nocturne, Rio de Janeiro , 2008
**Márcio Doctors, The Eva Klabin Collection, Rio de Janeiro.
