Art Madrid'25 – AND EDUARDO BALANZA OPENED UP THE DOORS OF HIS STUDIO…

The difficult task of defining Eduardo Balanza's work becomes easier when you share a live experience with him. We enjoyed a visit to his studio on Saturday, February 22, within the “Art Madrid-Proyector'20” action program. It was the perfect opportunity to getting to know his work and personality, and to understand the clear connections that exist between his various works. Between eclectic, versatile, technological, experimental, audiovisual, editorial... and many other qualifications applicable to the work of this author, the encounter with Eduardo helped us discover a generous artist, concerned above all with socio-political and environmental issues, who apply technology in a very rational way to his projects, and who is not satisfied with a simple reading of his pieces.

Photo by Txema Alcega

Eduardo Balanza (Murcia, 1971) graduated in Audiovisual Media, studied documentary film and screenplay at the International School of Film and Television in Havana, as well as at the School of Visual Arts in New York. He needs to travel, and for several years he was roaming between Berlin and Spain while working in theatre companies as a set designer. As a plastic artist, he has developed a multidisciplinary work taking sound and music as a starting point on which to research and build pieces, installations and performances. However, even these attempts to explain his career fall short, since, although the influence of video is evident in many of his works, in others the construction of artefacts or the emergence of conceptual discourse through periodic publications are the essence of the piece. As he himself admits: "It is true that I studied photography, screen printing, 3D, I worked in cinema, in fashion as a photographer, advertising and campaigns, theatre... The multidisciplinary involves attitude and creative concern." Indeed, Eduardo is attitude and concern.

Photo by Melisa Medina

What is clear is that Eduardo Balanza shows great humility and transparency in all his work. The transformation of each life experience into learning reveals the complexity of our world, the diversity that inhabits it, the different ways of understanding that exist and the need we have to adapt ourselves, beyond pure survival. In a recent interview, Eduardo explained: “Living has also become a bit of resistance. Living requires adaptation, as in an ice age." And part of that adaptation consists of admitting mistakes, knowing how to rectify because nothing is linear and today's society imposes on us a dictatorial obligation of permanent success totally fake without margin for error. On this, the artist comments:

Sometimes failure is pleasant. You have to lose battles, be thrown into the mud and have to get up. There is no need to be afraid to start from scratch; from failure, you learn a lot. We get frustrated very quickly, we have no stamina.

Photo by Txema Alcega

This humanistic approach to his own life trajectory has made identity, music and war his three main axes of work. Music as a factor of union, and war, of separation, and underlying these opposing forces, which sometimes collide and sometimes point in the same direction, is the collective identity. The artistic exploration of these intangible realities, but drivers of many current social movements, transforms into an infinity of projects that this author develops from his personal experience, wanting to transfer to his works all the rawness, aridity and harmony that the real world offers us. Eduardo explains that:

Where culture does not arrive, barbarism arrives. ... There is a clear absence of many values. Music, identity, collective identity, group movements are trending and the most interesting thing right now is collage. War, music and identity are my subjects, in the end, everyone talks about the same thing.

During the visit to his studio in Madrid, Eduardo presented us with the artwork “B71”, an electroacoustic instrument inspired by the baroque organs that combines sound and technology with an impressive result. The B71 organ is an instrument that works activated by vibrating loudspeakers on plates capable of connecting to meteorological data websites, according to the coordinates entered in the system to generate surround music based on loops. B71 works in both manual and automatic modes, generating its own sounds by itself. Visitors were able to fully understand its operation and test the organ while Eduardo explained all the technical implications of this installation work.

Frame from "La fragilidad de habitar", 2019, Eduardo Balanza

In addition to this and to know some of his editorial pieces in the FEU project: United Electronic Front, we were also able to enjoy his work on video. In the garage of his studio, which acts as a projection room, we watched his latest proposal: “La fragilidad de habitar”, a documentary video art work that shows the situation of extreme need in the shanty towns of temporary workers in Níjar (Almería). This piece, made in 2019, created mostly from zenith planes, brings to light a reality often ignored and shows ways of life-based on absolute subsistence. Today the work is on display at the Cepaim Foundation in Madrid.

And in the meantime, Eduardo continues working. He is currently developing some video research on hydroelectric complexes in Norway, the "Landscape Transformation" and the generation of sounds in these natural spaces, supported by the Skien Komune from Telemark.

From here we thank him for opening the door of his studio and sharing an excellent Saturday morning with us as we learned a little more about his work.

 

RAÍCES AFUERA. PERFORMANCE CYCLE X ART MADRID'25

Art Madrid celebrates twenty years of contemporary art from March 5 to 9, 2025, at the Galería de Cristal of the Palacio de Cibeles. During Art Week, it becomes an exhibition platform for national and international galleries and artists. In this edition, with the aim of providing a space for artists working in the realm of performance art, the fair presents Raíces Afuera, a performance cycle that explores notions of belonging and the need for rootedness in a contemporary world marked by fragmentation, displacement, and disconnection. Positioned within the fair as a critical and reflective space, the project challenges the individual’s relationship with their environment, community, and sense of identity.

PERFORMANCE: LAS FRONTERAS SIEMPRE TIENEN DOS LADOS. BY ELÉONORE OZANNE

March 6 | 19:00h. Galería de Cristal of the Palacio de Cibeles.


The real true tourist experience. Johanna Failer & Eléonore Ozanne. Performance Documentation.


You leave the house, and someone holds the door for you: "Oh, sorry—thank you." You’re walking down the street, and someone comes toward you: "Uh, sorry—thank you." If I’m late, if I can’t find something, if I don’t sit in my usual spot, if I ask for help, or if I don’t know what to say… "Sorry—thank you."

How many times have we said these two words? To whom? And why? Why does your mouth not sound the same as mine?


Day In, Day Out. Eléonore Ozanne. Performance Documentation.


Las fronteras siempre tienen dos lados invites us into the author's mind to discuss boundaries. Large boundaries that frighten. Tiny boundaries that are forgotten, and all those in between, with which we must negotiate, build, or tear down.

Las fronteras siempre tienen dos lados is a work that encourages reflection on the invisible borders that shape our daily lives. Through the words "sorry" and "thank you", the author sets up a dialogue about how, in our everyday interactions, we are constantly faced with limits and distances—both physical and emotional. Every time we use these words, we are acknowledging a separation, whether it’s letting someone pass or asking for help in moments of discomfort. The work highlights how these small phrases, often repeated without much thought, serve as a way to negotiate our relationships with the world and those around us.

In this context, the boundaries explored in the work are not just geographical, but also social and personal. The barriers that separate us from others may be subtle, but they significantly affect our daily lives. Through these gestures, we are constantly building, breaking down, or accepting the limits that define our relationship with others. Las fronteras siempre tienen dos lados challenges us to question how we perceive these boundaries and how words that seem simple actually reflect the complex dynamics of our existence.


The real true tourist experience. Johanna Failer y Eléonore Ozanne. Performance Documentation.


ABOUT ELÉONORE OZANNE

Eléonore Ozanne (Corbeil-Essonnes, France, 1990) is an artist and researcher working between France and Spain. She is a doctoral candidate in Fine Arts at UPV/EHU and Université de Pau et des Pays de l’Adour. Her work focuses on the relationship between the body and borders in everyday spaces. Through displacement, the multidisciplinary artist draws the concept of borders as physical limits or invisible walls that are crossed daily. She uses her body as the central axis of her work, exploring through actions, the movement through, across, or into predetermined spaces or times.

She has been awarded numerous residencies in Spain, Mexico, and Europe, including NauEstruch and CECDA in Veracruz. She has collaborated with artists such as Pilar Albarracín and is a member of the research teams Gizartea and Alter, where she actively participates in exploring ways to understand precariousness and displacement in the era of globalization. Her work has been exhibited at international festivals and venues, such as Matadero Madrid and Cidade da Cultura de Galicia. Additionally, she has published texts on art and precariousness in publishers like Dykinson and the University of the Basque Country.



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