Society today lives beset by contradictions. The progress of communications allows us to be permanently connected and share in real time our daily news. At a dizzying pace, contents are created, uploaded to the network, an exchange is generated seeking for virtual contact in a reality that condenses in the palm of our hand thanks to the smartphone. However, this hyperconnection takes place while a paradoxical phenomenon occurs, because the human being feels more isolated, alone and individualistic than ever.

Tetsuya Ishida. "Conveyor belt for people", 1996. Acrylic on board. Private collection, Singapur (via arsmagazine.com)

Loneliness is a consequence of the imperative of the new times. The demands of work, the frenetic production process, the generalisation of the same aspirations in life linked to success and money produce a huge identity vacuum. Although in previous historical periods many social advances came from the hand of collective claims and the generation of a sense of community, today the individual is focused on himself and his own achievements, which leads him to a deep sense of detachment. Because, let's not forget, the human being is social by nature and creates links with others. The creators of social networks knew perfectly these mechanisms that compel us to share the snippets of our lives with others but did not know how to anticipate the other side of the coin, which feeds on false appearances to build a fake everyday life, giving place to a personal alienation that becomes their virtual reality.

Tetsuya Ishida, "Soldier", 1996, acrylic on board, Shizuoka Prefectural Museum of Art, photo Takemi Art Photos, courtesy Kyuryudo Art Publishing Co., Ltd. (via museoreinasofia.es)

La preocupación por estos temas es motivo de reflexión para muchos creadores. El ser humano protagoniza una suerte de abandono de sí mismo, un extrañamiento de su verdadera esencia que resulta desolador. Pero el tiempo, sin piedad, no nos deja pensar en ello. No obstante, algunos artistas se imponen a esta tendencia y se concentran en reflejar lo que ellos mismos viven y observan. Así es el caso del artista japonés Tetsuya Ishida, cuyo trabajo refleja la situación del individuo contemporáneo, en un estado de ánimo afectado por los vaivenes económicos, las crisis financieras y la imposición de las exigencias del mercado. El resultado es una identidad ausente que conduce al aislamiento y a la falta de entendimiento de nuestro lugar en el mundo.

Tetsuya Ishida. “Return trip”, 2003 (via museoreinasofia.es)

El Museo Reina Sofía dedica la exposición titulada “Autorretrato de otro” a Tetsuya Ishida, joven creador que tuvo una corta e intensa trayectoria de apenas diez años de producción. Su obra desarrolla una narrativa propia en la que las personas aparecen encerradas en lugares claustrofóbicos, con una alteración de las escalas para subrayar el efecto de encierro y la angustiosa sensación de no hallar una salida. Los colores grises, ocres y verdosos crean la atmósfera de un ambiente industrial y metálico, donde la gente viste de uniforme y se confunde con la maquinaria. Seres miméticos que pueblan nuestra sociedad y esconden tras su mirada vidriosa la soledad del alma.

ABIERTO INFINITO. LO QUE EL CUERPO RECUERDA. CICLO DE PERFORMANCE X ART MADRID'26

Art Madrid, committed to creating a discursive platform for artists working within the field of performance and action art, presents Abierto Infinito: lo que el cuerpo recuerda, a proposal inspired by Erving Goffman’s ideas in The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life (Amorrortu Editores, Buenos Aires, 1997).

The project unfolds within a theoretical framework that directly engages with these premises, conceiving social interaction as a stage of carefully modulated performances designed to influence others’ perceptions. Goffman argues that individuals deploy both verbal and involuntary expressions to guide the interpretation of their behavior, sustaining roles and façades that define the situation for those who observe.

The body — the first territory of all representation — precedes both word and learned gesture. Human experience, conscious and unconscious alike, is inscribed within it. Abierto Infinito: lo que el cuerpo recuerda departs from this premise: representation inhabits existence itself, and life, understood as a succession of representations, transforms the body into a space of constant negotiation over who we are. In this passage, boundaries blur; the individual opens toward the collective, and the ephemeral acquires symbolic dimension. By inhabiting this interstice, performance simultaneously reveals the fragility of identity and the strength that emerges from encounter with others.

PERFORMANCE: OSCURECER UN PAPEL. BY ROCÍO VALDIVIESO

March 5 | 7:00 PM. Galería de Cristal of the Palacio de Cibeles.

Nocturnality. Installation. Rocío Valdivieso..

Oscurecer un papel forms part of a series of actions in which the artist engages in reading through repetition, memorization, and a measured degree of improvisation. Within this framework, a non-linear mode of reading emerges from a written text that is transformed when spoken aloud, assuming a different form in the act of articulation. The texts stem from an ongoing investigation into materiality, space, the relationships between body and matter, writing, the sculptural, and a sustained interest in the exploration of voice and orality.

The material from which Oscurecer un papel is constructed consists of a collection of purchase receipts the artist has been accumulating over time. The printed text they contain, together with the action of bringing them into proximity with a heat source—thereby activating the thermal paper on which they are produced—generates meanings that revolve around the notions of consumption and wear.

Rocío Valdivieso. Latent Aura. Performance documentation.

ABOUT ROCÍO VALDIVIESO

Rocío Valdivieso is an artist, researcher, and cultural manager. She is currently a PhD candidate in Fine Arts at the Complutense University of Madrid. She holds an MA in Research in Artistic Practices from the University of Castilla–La Mancha (UCLM) and a BA in Fine Arts from the National University of Tucumán, Argentina. She was a Fundación Carolina fellow from 2022 to 2023. She currently co-directs Errática. Laboratory of Processes and Critique in Madrid, alongside Romina Casile.

She was part of the PEEPA 2023 Program at the Centro de Residencias Artísticas, Matadero Madrid. She completed the 2021/22 Artists Program at Universidad Torcuato Di Tella, Buenos Aires, and in 2020 participated in the Intensive Curatorial Program of Proyecto PAC at Galería Gachi Prieto, Buenos Aires. She received the Visual Arts Promotion Award at the 4th Visual Arts Week of the Ente Cultural de Tucumán. She was awarded an AUGM scholarship for an exchange residency at UNESP, São Paulo, Brazil. She also participated in the International Residency Program La Ira de Dios and in the Acéfala Galería Residency for Argentine artists.