There is no intention to make a history of the Spanish video art development during the last ten years, in spite of the period of time invoked in the title, as if it was necessary to approach the corresponding narratives located in a forgotten space. This selection of works is part of the project which is intended to introduce the public into a local scene of video art practices, languages and aesthetics which are at the same time internationally global. Video art is made everywhere and it has been a powerful tool to radically change the art system as well as the art market and the economy of culture in general. To begin with the bet that the video art has made in order to develop and survive through the years promoting the research in different fields related to the visual arts can not be ignored. The possibility within this exhibition to envision 25 significant works each keeping its own individuality probably contributes to better understand what is going on in this field, not only in Spain but also in the art world as such. There is not only a single discourse through which it would be possible to point out the existing analogies among them and thus to build a story in order to explain all the other stories told in each work. Trying to do that would be a fake insofar these stories need to be distinguished from each other, because they are produced by artists from different generations and they do not want to lose their freedom or their intellectual ownership. It would be unreal to pretend to make a choice in order to show only how many similarities or differences could be found among them. Although a selection of this kind must show which has been the reason to put together these and not other samples, and how the final choice must be significantly meaningful.
The proposal itself looks at the way as how to articulate the works which have been done mainly by artists who experience the technologies associated to the newest video cameras and the narratives that can be produced with them. The main issue related to homogeneity is the capacity of heterogeneity that is showed by the artists resilience to be described as part as a complex identity based on general geography and their belonging to a nationality for good or less good reasons. Each work has an interest by itself; it reflects a position in front of the state of the video art world and wants to be consider as part of a system in which local and global production are not apart. Nevertheless it should be said that the current choice has been made dealing with narratives: the way of telling stories –we always tell stories- as well as what we tell and the structure of the story they want to tell.
The subject is not left aside to the extent that we can never forget that what is told brings about the information the artist wants to transmit. But the subject is not always the core of the question although it is part of the whole when it is about the elements that contribute to criticality and help to make a choice. The current issues which can be found show different directions: from history to the present social conflicts, from social to personal awareness of the world in which we live, from drama to banality or others. Bridges can be built from one end to the other as if they belonged to the same social landscape where we are. Experience of the medium allows to some extent a variety of models that no other art field can provide. Access to the moving image by artists who work in the visual arts gives the option to them to emphasize the power of communication and transmission through narratives that break into our daily lives in different ways as it can be noticed through the current issues in these works.
- Menene Gras Balaguer (Directora de Cultura y Exposiciones, CASA ASIA)
Hosted by CASA ASIA, Alternative Artspace LOOP
*image (left)
The hard answers of the same question of zity, 2006
6'17"
© Javier Peñafiel
