From the doodle to the chord and from the poem to the collage, the artists They travel different paths when it comes to expressing themselves and they do not usually fit so tightly into the compartments that critics and the market impose on them. Although a certain author gains notoriety for his work in writing or painting or music, the process he goes through until he reaches the end point of his work may have seasons in which he expresses himself in other languages.
“Of writers who paint and painters who write” deals, precisely, with the exhibition recently inaugurated in the Museum of books and language. There you can see images and texts produced by some of the most important artists in Argentina, contrary to their most recognizable craft.
Because of this “betrayal” of its usual material, the exhibition was baptized “Infidels”, even though the adjective “polyamorous” is a better fit for many of these multi-resourced creators. “That everything has to do with everything and that one thing leads to another is the minimum voracity that an unfaithful artist has,” explains the editor Malena Low, in the exhibition catalog. “If there is something that can be typical of infidels, it is that they should do one thing but do another,” says the writer Magdalena Testoni in the same volume.
The origin of the sample
In the powerhouse of ideas that is the gathering of the La Internacional bookstore, where the artist and editor Francisco Garamona is host to writers, painters and musicians; The idea was born of bringing together creators who work on different types of works, to show them beyond their usual productions. This was told Stephen Bitesnik, curator in charge of the team that carried out the exhibition “Infieles”, at the opening ceremony. The event, held on June 16, was very special because that same day María Moreno, director of the museum, was present after a long leave of absence due to a health problem. She came up with the name that the sample bears.
There were many attendees at that inauguration, an expected number given the quantity and quality of the 35 artists gathered at the exhibition.
Hanging there are works by established writers such as César Aira, Silvina Ocampo, Horacio González, Manuel Mujica Láinez, Osvaldo Lamborghini, Fernando Noy, Sergio Bizzio, Gabriela Cabezón Cámara, Osvaldo Baigorria, Washington Cucurto, Micaela Piñero and Nicolás Moguilevsky. Visual artists of the stature of León Ferrari, Luis Felipe Noé, Jorge Gumier Maier, Roberto Jacoby, Daniel Santoro, Renata Schussheim, Eduardo Stupía and María Luque. There are even musicians like Charly García and Ulises Conti and “all terrain” creators like Francisco Garamona, Guillermo Iuso, Ricardo Carreira, Fabio Kacero, Fernanda Laguna, Miguel Ángel Lens, Paula Maffía, Nacho Marciano, Naty Menstrual, Leticia Obeid, Dani Umpi. , Alejandro Urdapilleta and Ral Veroni.
“’Infieles’ makes visible translinguistic or residual procedures -waste materials, collages, record cover interventions- whose result is given by Obra”, explains Roberto Papateodosio, one of the curators.
Precisely, the exhibited works attest to the diversity of these artists who come here from very different formations. The enormous work of the team in charge of curation is also highlighted, to find images and texts that can be read/looked at together, while pointing out the blurred limit between the different disciplines.
In Daniel Santoro, the image is a classic bar, where artists and intellectuals meet and in which the figure of María Moreno stands out. “The bar gives you the opportunity to stop, look, not act”, writes the painter, next to it.
Renata Schusheim sets up a set with old photographs printed on black cloth. “What I don’t remember is the moment everything fell apart,” she says in her text.
Charly García intervenes photos of Helmut Newton along with the lyrics of “Disarm and bleed”. Of Horacio González we see caricatures in a notebook next to a text that says “To represent is then to let ‘the loss look at us’”. In Paula Maffia, form and substance are confused: “I took you / from my museum / of precious things, / of loves and friendships, / but your paintings still hang / on the walls of the house”, says the poem, superimposed on his drawings of hands making signs.
These are just examples of the great variation of texts and images exhibited on the walls of the museum.
“What happens when artistic practices, ways of making art, do not have a fixed point of reference? When do artists develop their work in a future of formats that can be writing, visual arts or music?” asks Papateodosio.
“Infidels” gives us the rare opportunity to observe the response.
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