I don’t get on the subway, it smells like a worker.
DR. RAÚL VICENCIO.
Every time I hear about art in public spaces financed by tax contributions, with the good intention of bringing culture closer to “the people” – especially family and children – I remember the endearing classes of Gaspar Galaz. In the last unit of his chair on the history of Chilean art, the academic usually spends a few minutes ranting against the object pieces scattered throughout Chile, even in the most remote landscapes, from the end of the last century to the present: “A whole fortune wasted on works that go unnoticed by pedestrians, teacher!” Galaz shouted angrily.
Shelters so that homeless people can weather the cold or the heat, deposits for the guano of wild birds, or blank canvases to vent passion or resentment, can be counted among the noble social functions of these works, according to to the criticism raised by Gaspar Galaz. The bachicha master is not without reason, when his perception of the recipients of that art reveals a lack of interest accompanied by lack of time; the time associated with the rhythm of work produced by capitalist alienation. This is not a coincidence in the criticism of Gaspar Galaz, since his diagnosis is formulated from the collection of paintings and sculptures distributed around the Santiago Metro.
On Wednesday, January 17, “The Book of Projects”, an exhibition by Ash Aravena curated by Ana María Saavedra and Luis Alarcón, was inaugurated at the Ñuñoa Metro station. The couple who founded Santiago’s most peripheral gallery in the late 90s once again broke a record: the earliest scheduled contemporary art opening. The meeting was at 11 in the morning on level -3 of the station, where coffee was offered – courtesy of the Swiss embassy – to wake up the attendees who are not used to attending such events at such a unique time for contemplate art.
The ceremony took place while the pedestrian circulation dynamics of the place ran at its usual pace; Suddenly one or another user of the transport network was tempted by the whiff of coffee, and then looked askance at the construction sites to continue their work day.
The exhibition consists of a series of 48 color drawings and short writings painted in watercolor, arranged in 24 paintings organized in a modular structure that diagonally crosses Suizspacio; contemporary art exhibition platform resulting from an institutional alliance between MetroArte and the Swiss Embassy, recognizable by the flashing of a red neon that interrupts the wandering of those who circulate daily through the station. The visual and literary pieces that Ash Aravena began in the context of his stay in Switzerland, refer to the formulation of architectural projects of different sizes, in the manner of sketches and artist’s logs.
These images and words make up The Book of Projects, which can be read as an illustrated plaquette; that is, as a literary and graphic piece of a limited story. In this case, what is unique about Ash Aravena’s illustrated plaquette are the dimensions of the objects that far exceed those of serials dating from nineteenth-century France and the fact that it was conceived as a site-specific project: the Metro de Santiago.
After attending the opening, I was left thinking, without yet getting an answer, about the possible “site-specific” components of Ash Aravena’s exhibition. If anything, whether or not the decision of the artist and the pair of curators was “correct” when classifying the proposal in the way in which contemporary art is produced based on the context – specifically architectural or landscape – that houses it. This is added, on the other hand, to the place selected for the exhibition – a metro station – whose universal, homogeneous, functional and aseptic architectural characteristics are linked to the notion of “non-places” coined by Marc Augé; French philosopher interested in transit places such as airports, highways, hotels or supermarkets.
It is daring that “The Book of Projects” has been inscribed in the midst of such a contradiction, from which multiple readings can emerge. A priori, the intersection between site-specific art and non-places would be incompatible. What would be specific about a work designed for a place that by definition lacks specificity?
It is worth mentioning here that from the notion formulated by Marc Augé a negative stance towards these transit spaces emerges, where the subjects remain anonymous and the architecture that shelters us also; This is revealed by the large photographic plans that have recorded subway stations throughout the globe: it is difficult to differentiate – except for people with world – in which city those images were captured.
One of the references that the artist and the pair of curators mention as fundamental in The Book of Projects is Aleksandr Rodchenko: belonging to the historical avant-garde of Russian constructivism, who thought of architecture, art and literature as ways to transform the world; Therein lies the political factor of the avant-garde, which can effectively and quickly be subsumed by the aesthetic and political gluttony of the capitalist system, as has historically happened with all cultural expressions that were disruptive and today are for sale to us, the customers who buy. our own domestication.
The modernization processes of Russia and Chile, despite having been triggered in different historical processes, share some relevant aspects to remember here; especially in regards to culture, economy and politics; although we must look with caution at the ideologies that accompanied these modernizations.
Both countries were based on an economy with an oligarchic and agrarian-peasant matrix, and then led to industrialization, despite the fact that the magnitudes and times are not comparable, and that our autonomy and scientific-technical development have been interrupted by a Coup. Also, regarding the construction of cultural imaginaries, both nations agree on a system of representation mostly involved in producing landscapes, altarpieces of social customs and paintings of historical relevance; Subsequently, these cultural productions radically turned towards representations capable of transforming their context beyond being mere consequences of their spirit of the times, along with their awareness as objects of artistic value.
The difference with the space here is that in Chile most of these great utopian modernizations remained in the formulation stage. When delving into the visual and literary pieces of Ash Aravena, those twists and turns appear between the common history of both latitudes, both from the pedestrian to reflections of a more “transcendental” order.
This is precisely another of the merits of “The Book of Projects”, going against the grain of the grandiloquent solemnity that governs most local exhibitions, where it is believed that throwing abstract ideas from a handful of contemporary authors suggested in The showcase of a provincial bookseller is the recipe for success and the critical thickness of the debate. Unlike those neophytes, avant-garde art has known how to politicize the pedestrian, such as the songs of Los Prisioneros, who share communal origins with Ash Aravena (the artist maintains a physical resemblance to Miguel Tapia, when he was young).
Among drawings of buildings built from different materials, where the protagonist is raw and brushed wood, a prose poem written by Ash Aravena is moving:
“The objects are sick, schizophrenic and burdened by the weight of their functionality all the time. The “designer” must find a way to strike a balance between remembering and forgetting.”
The artist attributes human illnesses to the pedestrian objects that make up “The Book of Projects”; Schizophrenia and overwhelm are discomforts that plague us daily, while some arrogant people insidiously ask, “And what is your project?” This personification of objects described by Ash Aravena puts its finger on the wound of a culture that has systematically objectified us to the limit of producing subjects whose value lies solely in their level of projection in a cruel world, where your importance is directly proportional to your economic functionality.
Perhaps it is in this ambivalence between subject and object, which reaches its paroxysm in non-places, that the contradiction of the site-specific art of “The Book of Projects” is resolved.
Perhaps it does not solve it and the artist together with the curators now invented non-specific site art. That’s not what’s important. It does not matter who is or is not the inventor of the potato eye or the fig shell. The important thing is that the exhibition will remain open until Tuesday, March 12. I hope that the pedestrians who circulate through the Ñuñoa Metro come to see the exhibition, and that Gaspar Galaz appears on the closing day for the launch of the catalog (Sunday, March 10 from 5:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m.).
