Socioplastics advances its investigations when it ceases to behave as a mere disciplinary label and becomes an epistemological architecture capable of organising bodies, materials, spaces, images, institutions, bibliographies, platforms and cultural memories within a single operative field. Its force lies in refusing to separate art, urbanism, pedagogy, archive and technology; instead, it makes them function as strata of one conceptual infrastructure, where social reality appears as plastic matter that can be stabilised, deformed, indexed, cited and redistributed. CyborgText names this mutation: a text no longer addressed solely to the human reader or the classical academic archive, but also to search engines, DOI repositories, bibliographic systems, algorithmic platforms and semantic retrieval models. In this sense, CamelTags —SonicTerrain, MaterialDecay, PublicSpeech, DurationalPractice, SystemPressure, LinguisticProvocation— operate as linguistic prostheses: they condense theory, method and archive into recognisable, portable and reusable units. The case of LAPIEZA-LAB and Anto Lloveras’s sequence of works demonstrates how an artistic practice may become a research field: from urban interventions, relational objects and critical pedagogies to distributed archives, indexable essays and conceptual nodes, the work ceases to be an isolated object and becomes a system of public legibility. Thus, Socioplastics does not merely study how form acquires social power; it designs the conditions through which knowledge circulates, resists disappearance and produces cultural consequence. Its conclusion is unequivocal: research no longer consists in accumulating documents, but in constructing a landscape where every concept, work, citation, platform and material residue acts as living infrastructure for thought.
Showing posts with label contemporary art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label contemporary art. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 23, 2026
Monday, April 27, 2026
Saturday, April 25, 2026
Socioplastics is no longer a project but a field in formation. Its force comes from scale and structure: two million words, two million visitors, twenty channels, twenty books, anchors, datasets and recurring concepts. These elements do not merely accumulate; they create subfields with internal necessity. Architecture, urbanism, art, ecology, media, pedagogy and systems theory become load-bearing parts of one epistemic architecture. The result is a corpus that can be searched, cited, inhabited and expanded. Socioplastics therefore marks the passage from individual production to disciplinary infrastructure: a living field built by recurrence, circulation and structural density.
Socioplastics names a metabolic architecture of knowledge in which art, architecture, epistemology, media systems, and pedagogy become mutually load-bearing. Against curatorial transdisciplinarity as decorative adjacency, AntoLloveras’s LAPIEZA-LAB corpus constructs a field whose legitimacy derives from internal dependency rather than institutional ratification. Architecture here is no longer the design of buildings but the arrangement of epistemic thresholds: DOI records, century packs, datasets, archives, Wikidata entities, and distributed platforms operate as foundations, joints, and semantic reinforcements. Contemporary art supplies the operative body through textile interventions, social sculpture residues, sonic walks, and performative assemblages, where concepts are materially tested before they harden into theoretical clusters. Systems and media theory then explain the corpus’s persistence: each node feeds prior nodes, each identifier strengthens adjacent identifiers, and each platform—Zenodo, Wikidata, Blogger, Substack, Medium, Hugging Face—becomes a material condition of distributed durability. The case of Socioplastics Core Layer demonstrates this field ontogenesis with particular force: the Zenodo DOI functions not as archival ornament but as infrastructural inscription, stabilising a corpus that refuses curatorial containment. Its decisive claim is therefore methodological: a field emerges when its subfields can no longer be removed without collapse. Lloveras, A. (2026) Socioplastics Core Layer. Zenodo. Available at: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.19162689
Tuesday, April 21, 2026
LAPIEZA (2022) LAMAR
134 LA MAR 2022:
LAPIEZA (2024)
161 CONFETTI (1902–1932) 2024:
LAPIEZA (2016) THE WORD
If 2015 was the year of FRESH MUSEUM—the project's decisive turn toward institutional infiltration and the portable exhibition format—then 2016 is the year of the cut. The five series that constitute this year—SWEET CORN BRUTALISM (071) , INCISIONS AND DISSECTIONS (072) , EXFOLIATION (073) , WILD FLOWERS (074) , and THE WORD (075) —form a coherent arc of operations performed on the body of the city, the body of the archive, and the body of language itself. The titles are surgical: incisions, dissections, exfoliation. They are also vegetal: sweet corn, wild flowers. And they are linguistic: the word. The year spans nodes 915 to 1000—eighty-six nodes in total, culminating in the millennium node, the thousandth entry in the LAPIEZA archive. 2016 is the year the project crosses from three digits to four. It is the year the archive becomes a library. It is the year the cut becomes a method. The node ranges are precise: SWEET CORN BRUTALISM occupies 915–926 (12 nodes); INCISIONS AND DISSECTIONS occupies 927–940 (14 nodes); EXFOLIATION occupies 941–960 (20 nodes); WILD FLOWERS occupies 961–980 (20 nodes); THE WORD occupies 981–1000 (20 nodes). The numbers are not accidental. The series grow in length as the year progresses, building toward the ceremonial hundredth node of THE WORD. The project is counting down to 1000, but it is also counting up: from 915 to 1000, from the middle of the ninth century to the threshold of the tenth. The millennium is not celebrated; it is approached. And the approach is a series of cuts.
THE WORD (981-1000) concludes a season with twenty pieces from 2016, visible at
Monday, April 20, 2026
Sunday, March 15, 2026
Drawing simultaneously upon the expanded artistic field articulated by Joseph Beuys, the encounter-based grammar of Nicolas Bourriaud, and the infrastructural sensibilities developed in contemporary maintenance theory, Anto Lloveras transforms theory into what might be termed executable cultural infrastructure.
Beuys’s notion of social sculpture, wherein society itself constitutes the plastic medium of artistic intervention, is retained yet critically re-engineered: the charismatic shamanic persona is replaced by a procedural authority grounded in syntactic density and recursive conceptual structures. Similarly, Bourriaud’s relational aesthetics—initially centred on convivial encounters and temporary micro-utopias—is reconfigured into a broader metabolic relationality that incorporates ecological systems, algorithmic processes and infrastructural networks. Early LAPIEZA activations illustrate this transition, transforming simple urban gestures into distributed nodes within civic ecologies. The framework further resonates with the maintenance ethics articulated by scholars such as Shannon Mattern and Maria Puig de la Bellacasa, whose emphasis on care, repair and infrastructural literacy informs Socioplastics’ emphasis on metabolic maintenance as a primary cultural operation. Finally, the systemic logic of actor-network theory, associated with Bruno Latour and informed by Maturana and Varela’s concept of autopoiesis, provides the structural model through which artworks function as self-referential epistemic assemblages. In this synthesis philosophy ceases to operate as commentary upon artistic production and instead becomes its generative infrastructure. Socioplastics therefore proposes a rigorous shift within contemporary practice: the artwork no longer represents ideas but constitutes a load-bearing epistemic system, capable of sustaining meaning within increasingly volatile informational environments.
Thursday, February 19, 2026
Diasporic Cartographies
Situated between Lagos and London, Tiwani Contemporary has cultivated an epistemic corridor in which artistic production becomes a vehicle for diasporic negotiation rather than a mere reflection of it. Within this transnational architecture, Emma Prempeh articulates a painterly lexicon that transfigures domestic interiors into theatres of mnemonic luminosity. Her canvases, suffused with radiant gold and metallic tonalities, refuse decorative passivity; instead, they activate gold as material historiography, invoking both sacred iconography and the extractive economies that have historically shaped Ghana’s geopolitical landscape. Through this alchemical strategy, intimate portraiture becomes a conduit for diasporic consciousness, embedding collective memory within private space. The migratory exhibition of her works between West Africa and Britain sharpens their resonance: in Lagos, the chromatic heat echoes environmental and cultural proximities; in London, the same surfaces acquire a reflective coolness, accentuating themes of displacement and belonging. A specific exhibition cycle staged across both cities demonstrates how these paintings retain affective intensity while recalibrating their institutional inflection, thereby evidencing the gallery’s role as connective tissue within plural art ecologies. Ultimately, the conjunction of Tiwani Contemporary’s curatorial vision and Prempeh’s luminous figuration substantiates a compelling thesis: that gold operates as archive, aura, and bridge, transforming transcontinental circulation into a coherent aesthetic and intellectual proposition wherein light itself becomes the syntax of diasporic being.
Saturday, February 7, 2026
La paradoja del lujo
En tiempos de crisis estructural, donde la precariedad y la ansiedad social reconfiguran las jerarquías simbólicas del deseo, el lujo se manifiesta como una ostentación ambigua, simultáneamente aspirada y denostada, codiciada y ridiculizada; como explora Rosa Olivares, el lujo no es solo un régimen de objetos sino una gramática del poder visual y corporal, una marca identitaria que separa a los pocos que poseen de los muchos que anhelan; entre Ferraris, ostras, relojes Cartier o internados suizos, emerge una teatralidad grotesca del privilegio, donde la moda, el arte, la publicidad y la pornografía del exceso configuran un imaginario global, ya no exclusivo ni refinado, sino vulgar, repetitivo y saturado, donde la diferencia ya no reside en el buen gusto sino en la acumulación sin medida; figuras como Paris Hilton, Martin Parr o Cindy Sherman revelan esta estetización extrema, este simulacro hipervisual de un lujo decadente, que exhibe con crudeza su vacío, su mal gusto, su soledad comprada; sin embargo, en la raíz etimológica que une luxus y lujuria, se encuentra también el verdadero nervio del lujo contemporáneo: una pulsión de posesión inmediata, ansiosa, insaciable, que vincula el dinero con el cuerpo, el deseo con la dominación, la joya con la carne; así, artistas como Mireia Sentís o Daniela Rossell nos advierten de la confusión entre identidad y consumo, entre el yo y sus signos, entre deseo y mercancía; en contraste, persiste una intuición alternativa: el lujo auténtico podría ser el tiempo no comprado, el espacio íntimo, el silencio sin deuda, la lectura sin prisa, la paz sin algoritmo, es decir, ese tipo de abundancia impalpable que no se mide en quilates ni se exhibe en escaparates, pero que el mercado no puede ofrecer; en esa tensión, entre el exceso grosero y el anhelo sereno, se juega la batalla simbólica del lujo como mito moderno, donde el arte deviene crítica, ironía y reflejo de una sociedad que no sabe si aborrecer o desear aquello que la oprime. Luxury is no longer elegance but anxiety. It sells desire yet reflects fear, revealing a world rich in objects and poor in meaning. Olivares, R. (2011) Tener o no tener, Exit. Disponible en: https://exit-express.com/lujo-rosa-olivares/
Friday, February 6, 2026
A commodified utopia
In his critical reassessment of Nicolas Bourriaud’s Relational Aesthetics, Stewart Martin unveils the profound contradictions embedded in the claim that art, by reorienting itself toward interpersonal relations rather than discrete objects, might escape the commodified structures of capitalist society; while Bourriaud celebrates the ephemeral and convivial experiences generated by artists like Rirkrit Tiravanija or Pierre Huyghe as the foundation of a new micro-political art form, Martin asserts that this very celebration naively fetishises “the social”, mistaking an idealised communal exchange for a true rupture with commodity logic; relational artworks, in their seeming resistance to objecthood, may in fact conceal their full complicity in the aestheticisation of capitalist interaction, offering free soup, collaborative performances, or participatory installations that echo the corporate rhetoric of “user experience” and “customer relations” rather than dismantling them; this is most evident in the critique of projects such as Vanessa Beecroft’s staged femininities or Tiravanija’s gallery-cooked meals, whose supposed social emancipation unfolds within the very circuits of market legitimation and institutional commodification, and is even further deconstructed in Santiago Sierra’s confrontational performances, where the raw exploitation of labour under capitalism is rendered visible, not avoided; Martin proposes that Adorno’s dialectic of autonomy and heteronomy, rather than Bourriaud’s utopian immediacy, offers a more rigorous critical apparatus, where art’s commodified nature becomes the site of resistance through its reflexive exposure rather than its disavowal; thus, the relational project—far from inaugurating an art “beyond exchange”—may rehearse, in aesthetic form, the very capitalist structures it seeks to evade, and its true critical potential lies only in recognising and foregrounding that ambivalent complicity rather than denying it outright. Martin, S. (2007) Critique of Relational Aesthetics. Third Text, 21(4), pp. 369–386. doi:10.1080/09528820701433323
Sunday, February 1, 2026
Artistic Research Fellowship
The 2026 NOLA/NYC Research Fellowship by ARCAthens represents a vivid testament to how transnational artistic mobility catalyses the expansion of conceptual boundaries, as it invites Greek visual practitioners and curators to recontextualise their practice through immersive residencies in New Orleans, New York City, and Sag Harbor, encouraging not only research but also prolonged exposure to socio-cultural heterogeneity; this year's fellows, Dionisis Christofilogiannis, a multidisciplinary artist and academic whose background spans from mechanical engineering to fine arts pedagogy, and Vicky Tsirou, a curator committed to examining the commons, spatial politics, and ecological entanglements, embody the dual ethos of the programme: rigorous theoretical inquiry and situated artistic experimentation; while Christofilogiannis’ transdisciplinary gaze and teaching practice at The American College of Greece anchor his research within a structural aesthetic grammar, Tsirou’s academic trajectory—rooted in architecture and critical theory—foregrounds curatorial practices as spatial activism and discursive intervention, weaving environmental and communal concerns into art infrastructures; a particularly illustrative example is Tsirou’s exploration of participatory methodologies and the activation of public space, juxtaposed with Christofilogiannis’ interest in industrial design histories and their translation into visual language, both of which will be developed further through institutional collaborations in the US context; meanwhile, the fellowship’s critical scaffolding is upheld by an experienced jury panel, including William Pittman Andrews of the Ogden Museum, known for fostering narratives of the American South, and Scout Hutchinson of the Parrish Art Museum, who brings a nuanced curatorial perspective on materiality and form; moreover, the inclusion of prior fellow Maro Michalakakos, whose oeuvre probes mortality and existential liberation through material poetics, signals the program’s commitment to long-term fellow engagement, and the recent board appointment of Chelsea Guerdat, whose curatorial range spans continents, cements the initiative’s global intent; this fellowship, then, is not merely a logistical support mechanism, but an evolving architecture of relational aesthetics, critical reflection, and institutional memory, setting a precedent for how fellowships might construct transcultural dialogues rooted in deep research rather than surface-level exchange.
Saturday, January 31, 2026
Ephemeral Encounters and Enduring Resonance: How UJ’s 2026 Arts & Culture Programme Reimagines Temporality and Collective Experience in the Arts
Framed under the theme Ephemeral, the 2026 UJ Arts & Culture Programme emerges as a sensorial palimpsest where performance, visual art, and participatory encounters collide to articulate the fragile beauty of the momentary, aligning with the University of Johannesburg’s commitment to Pan-African excellence, social impact, and creative innovation, this year’s offering presents a curatorial ethos that privileges presence over permanence, creating an aesthetic of transience that resists commodification and instead foregrounds shared, embodied experience, the season unfolds as a dynamic procession of events—from Gregory Maqoma’s diasporic choreography and Bev Butkow’s suspended installations, to the inaugural ARAK Fellowship and risk-aware student theatre by Jade Bowers—that reveal how art dissolves borders while amplifying dialogue, these temporal interventions act as catalysts for reflection: whether in the haunting reverberations of Jeanne Zaidel-Rudolph’s Human Rights Oratorio, the spatial poetics of Chronogram, or the spiritual jazz-inflected chants of ESINAM and Sibusile Xaba, each component of the programme enacts ephemerality not as disappearance, but as an imprint, a spectral architecture of thought and feeling that persists beyond the artwork’s physicality, one emblematic case is The Bacchae: An African Choral Ballet, a bold synthesis of classical myth, African cosmology, and choral choreography that exemplifies how transient events can generate sustained transformation across artistic and cultural registers, directed by Jay Pather and scored by Neo Muyanga, the production confronts the viewer with the porous threshold between tradition and experiment, conclusionally, UJ’s 2026 initiative doesn’t merely programme events—it curates moments that matter, asking audiences to embrace the liminality of live art as a generative force, shaping the social imaginary long after lights dim and spaces empty, and in doing so, the institution reinforces its role as a cultural conduit, where temporary works ignite enduring resonance.
Thursday, January 29, 2026
El arte cuando calla, consiente
En un contexto donde la política institucional se diluye entre la indiferencia ciudadana y el espectáculo mediático, el arte emerge como uno de los últimos bastiones donde la disidencia, la crítica y la memoria encuentran refugio y resonancia, pues incluso cuando evita pronunciarse explícitamente, el arte participa de lo político al enunciar una visión del mundo, situarse en un contexto específico o simplemente decidir su propia evasión como postura, y esta perspectiva es precisamente la que articula Rosa Olivares en su reflexión desde EXIT sobre la dimensión política del arte contemporáneo, donde plantea que cada gesto, por mínimo que sea, constituye una forma de intervención simbólica en la realidad social, es decir, que no existe arte apolítico, porque no existen seres humanos desprovistos de contexto; la artista Teresa Margolles, por ejemplo, transforma los restos del dolor social en instalaciones que, más que obras, son actos de denuncia, mientras que la mirada de Kader Attia sobre la reparación cultural en las excolonias propone una estética directamente vinculada a procesos de resistencia y sanación colectiva, y aun los sectores tradicionalmente considerados como neutrales –como la edición o la museografía– revelan su participación en el engranaje ideológico cuando seleccionan, omiten o jerarquizan contenidos para el público, porque cada publicación, cada exposición, cada fotografía seleccionada para una revista como EXIT configura un discurso y, por lo tanto, un posicionamiento frente a la historia, al presente y al porvenir, por eso el llamado no es a producir panfletos, sino a asumir conscientemente que crear es posicionarse, y que incluso el silencio artístico forma parte de la conversación política, ya sea como complicidad, como evasión o como crítica silenciosa.
Wednesday, January 28, 2026
Birdwatching in the Art Market
In her sharp and observational essays scattered across EXIT Express and EXIT #98, Rosa Olivares invites us to reconsider the archetype of the collector not as a unified figure, but as a complex and fragmented taxonomy of desires, privileges and performative roles within the art world, suggesting that speaking of "collectors" as a homogenous group is as naive as referring to all flying creatures as birds, since behind the acquisition of artworks lie motivations that range from genuine passion to ruthless speculation, from social climbing to interior design aesthetics; using a vivid analogy with dog breeds, Olivares maps out a gallery of collectors: some are decorators, others investors, a few become gallerists by accident, and fewer still are lone amateurs whose collections stem not from capital but from a slow, silent love of art, making her writing not just a critique of market dynamics but a mirror to the cultural value systems we take for granted, especially when she states that not all who are called collectors truly are, echoing that the presence of capital does not automatically create meaningful cultural contribution, and this is particularly relevant in the context of art fairs, private foundations, and the real estate-inflected elitism that increasingly defines the artistic landscape; in her view, the art market functions like a zoo, where every agent (curator, artist, critic, buyer) performs a role scripted by invisible forces of prestige and profit, and while the big names fill up catalogues and auction houses, other quieter agents shape the future of contemporary creation through persistence and affection, not through spectacle or accumulation, which is why her critique, however wrapped in humour or metaphor, ultimately demands that we rethink not only who collects but why, how and for whom the collection exists.
Saturday, January 27, 2024
IV Art and Architecture BIENNIAL ________ Lagos, Nigeria 2024 __________TEXTILE PAVILION_______Circular Economy_________The Outsiders________ Acción Cultural Española___ OCA Norway____G.A.S. Foundation_____Embajada Española en Abuja_____ LAPIEZA ART SERIES
LAGOS BIENNIAL OF ART AND ARCHITECTURE.
4TH EDITION - FEBRUARY 2024 - TEAM OUTSIDER.
María Alejandra Gatti
Oscar de Carmen
Martinka Bobrikova
Anto Lloveras
RESEARCH TRIP - GOALS AND ACHIEVEMENTS
The project proposed for the Lagos Biennial 2024 has been outlined and predefined after the research stay in the city of Lagos. All members of the OUTSIDER team have developed an intense agenda, with several simultaneous research vectors in relation to the context of the project. On the one hand, the city, they have researched on the city, one of the most populous in the world, and its particular situation in a complex ethnically and economically emerging country. Lagos is one of the cultural and economic epicenters of both Nigeria and Africa. The neighborhoods that make up the islands, Victoria and Lagos, which concentrate a large part of the business and leisure activity, have been intensively toured. Likewise, a part of Mainland, the great residential city, has been visited, with special views of the University, guided by Opeyemi Balogun, and the CCA Art Center, with conversations with the director and the curator. Within the specific, the surroundings of the Tafawa Balewa square, the place where the biennial will take place, the team has been there several times to understand its scale, its complex structure of mixed uses, and if its immediate surroundings, with housing and commercial streets. Some local associations have been visited nearby, emerging pioneers in the creation of mixed programs that allow artists who come from abroad to stay for residencies, together with production workshops, which can support the development of projects. The residency took place on the Lekki peninsula, at the G.A.S Foundation, where the team lived with other residents, who came from London and other regions of Nigeria, participating in the inaugurations and weaving a socialization necessary In the city. They also visited classic bookstores, some artists' workshops, the textile market, the Freedom Park, and the association of African Artists. They also met with the Spanish Consulate, who kindly offered then their collaboration so that the project would have transnational alliances. This summary reflects the team's interest not only in understanding the physical environment and its social and economic conditions, but also the artistic networks that operate in different economic orders, from the institutional to the private sector.
FILMS
140922 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h6S9CfFPFCE WEDNESDAY
130922 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFpO6qprI4g TUESDAY
110922 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6fiX9Nxxqs SUNDAY
100922 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCMBydinPas SATURDAY
090922 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3M3w2tXpWAE FRIDAY
080922 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J9nzsWMFfz4&t=6s THURSDAY
070922 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wxaELs99GlQ WEDNESDAY
060922 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwnU9pIHuGI&t=2s TUESDAY
040922 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NhAQaKiG7o&t=20s SUNDAY
CONCEPT >
OUTSIDER >
Through a public call we have been selected to participate in the third and fourth edition of the Lagos Biennial in Nigeria. Organized in two phases, the first consisted of an online participation for which we developed a video and the production of a series of texts that presented the theoretical and conceptual bases of the project. The second phase will take place in 2023 at the Tafawa Balewa Square in the city of Lagos. To this end, in September 2022 we have carried out a field research trip to the city. For two weeks we carried out visits, interviews and a series of audiovisual pieces, which were the basis of current contacts with our future collaborators. We have established direct contacts with local agents who actively and practically address the problems that bring us together in this project. Artists, activists and other agents who generate real strategies to face the conflict of excess textile waste in the region, who have agreed to collaborate with us on this project. Within the framework of the 4th edition of the Biennial of Lagos we propose an innovative project that consists of generating a textile pavilion through a series of collaborations with local agents in order to face, address and respond to the problem related to textile waste that they arrive in the Global South disguised as second-hand clothes. As a result of the “Fast fashion” phenomenon, the consumption and overproduction of textiles, countries like the United States, China, the United Kingdom, or Germany, send tons of second-hand clothes to African countries.
The main goal of the project is to propose alternatives that provide ecological prosperity, as opposed to destruction, and provide real information and tools to the community. We want to contribute to generating a circular textile economy through direct action on environmental abuse. Being able to contextualize the waste produced from the north is a commitment that seems fundamental to us. During the biennial period, and under the roof of the built shelter, we will organize talks and workshops with local agents. We want to involve the community, to collectively reflect on this conflict from an action perspective that, through each phase of the project, generates sustainable tools with a future perspective. “Outsider” is a response to the existing conflict around textile waste that is produced as a result of consumption and overproduction. As participants in the Biennial of Lagos, we will carry out a collaboration with local agents in order to address this problem through the creation of a textile pavilion made with these materials, which will serve as a roof, a refuge for activities that propose to generate tools for the development of a circular textile economy for the community. We will more formally engage community members in a variety of settings, from university students and established entrepreneurs to women working as porters or street vendors, as well as international designers and brands in circular product design and material transformation. . The proposed proposal starts from the beginning in how to respond within the regional territorial context of West Africa where the consequences of the current system of consumption and overproduction of textile materials generated for the demand of the Western world are verified
G.A.S. FOUNDATION LAGOS
BIENAL DE ARTE Y ARQUITECTURA DE LAGOS, NIGERIA
4ª EDICIÓN
DOCUMENTO MEMORIA DEL EQUIPO OUTSIDER
VIAJE PREVIO DE INVESTIGACIÓN SOCIO-CONTEXTUAL
RESUMEN. CRÓNICA. OBJETIVOS Y METAS.
María Alejandra GattiOscar de CarmenMartinka BobrikovaAnto Lloveras
El proyecto propuesto para la Bienal de Lagos 2024 ha sido perfilado y predefinido tras la estancia de investigación en la ciudad de Lagos. Todos los miembros del equipo OUTSIDER han desarrollado una intensa agenda, con varios vectores de investigación simultáneos en relación al contexto del proyecto. Por un lado, se ha investigado la ciudad, la gran ciudad, una de las más pobladas del mundo, y su particular situación en un país complejo étnica y económicamente emergente. Lagos es uno de los epicentros culturales y económicos de Nigeria y África. Se han recorrido los barrios que componen las islas, Victoria y Lagos, que concentran gran parte de la actividad empresarial y de ocio. Asimismo, se ha recorrido una parte de Mainland, la gran ciudad residencial, con vistas especiales a la Universidad, de la mano de Opeyemi Balogun, y al centro de arte CCA, con conversaciones con su director y su comisario. Dentro de lo específico, los alrededores de la plaza Tawafa Balewa, lugar donde se desarrollará la bienal, han sido visitados en varias oportunidades para entender su escala, su compleja estructura de usos mixtos, y si su entorno inmediato, con viviendas con calles comerciales. Se han visitado algunas asociaciones locales cercanas, emergentes pioneras en la creación de programas mixtos que permiten la estancia de artistas que vienen del exterior para realizar residencias, junto con talleres de producción, que pueden apoyar el desarrollo de proyectos. La residencia tuvo lugar en la península de Lekki, en la Fundación G.A.S, donde convivió con otros residentes, que venían de Londres y otras regiones de Nigeria, participando de las inauguraciones y tejiendo una socialización necesaria en la ciudad, también hemos visitado librerías clásicas, algunos talleres de artistas, el mercado textil, el Parque de la Libertad y la asociación de Artistas Africanos. También nos hemos reunido con el consulado español, que amablemente nos ofreció su colaboración para que el proyecto tenga alianzas transnacionales. Este resumen refleja el interés del equipo no solo por comprender el entorno físico y sus condiciones sociales y económicas, sino también las redes artísticas que operan en diferentes órdenes económicos, desde el sector institucional hasta el privado.
A través de una convocatoria pública hemos sido seleccionados para participar de la tercera y cuarta edición de la Bienal de Lagos en Nigeria. Organizada en dos fases, la primera consistió en una participación online para la cual desarrollamos un video y la producción de una serie de textos que presentaban las bases teóricas y conceptuales del proyecto. La segunda fase tendrá lugar en 2023 en la Plaza Tafawa Balewa de la ciudad de Lagos. Para dicho fin, en septiembre del 2022 hemos realizado un viaje de investigación de campo en la ciudad. Durante dos semanas realizamos visitas, entrevistas y una serie de piezas audiovisuales, que fueron la base de los actuales contactos con nuestros futuros colaboradores. Hemos establecido contactos directos con agentes locales que abordan de forma activa y práctica la problemática que nos convoca en este proyecto. Artistas, activistas y otros agentes que generan estrategias reales para enfrentar el conflicto del exceso de residuos textiles en la región, que han aceptado colaborar con nosotros en este proyecto. En el marco de la 4º edición de la Bienal de Lagos planteamos un proyecto innovativo que consiste en generar un pabellón textil a través de una serie de colaboraciones con agentes locales con el fin de enfrentar, abordar y responder a la problemática vinculada los residuos textiles que llegan al sur Global disfrazados de ropa de segunda mano. Como resultado del fenómeno del “Fast fashion”, el consumo y la sobreproducción de textiles, países como Estados Unidos, China, Reino Unido, o Alemania, envían toneladas de ropa de segunda mano a países de África.
El objetivo principal del proyecto es proponer alternativas que aporten prosperidad ecológica, en contraposición a la destrucción, y dar información y herramientas reales a la comunidad. Queremos contribuir a generar una economía textil circular a través de una acción directa sobre los abusos medioambientales. Poder contextualizar los residuos producidos desde el norte es un compromiso que nos parece fundamental de tomar. Durante el periodo de la bienal, y bajo el techo del refugio construido, organizaremos charlas y workshops de la mano de agentes locales. Queremos involucrar a la comunidad, para de forma colectiva reflexionar sobre este conflicto desde una perspectiva de acción que a través de cada fase del proyecto genera herramientas sostenibles y con perspectiva de futuro. “Outsider” es una respuesta al conflicto existente en torno a los desechos textiles que se producen como resultado del consumo y la sobreproducción. Como participantes de la Bienal del Lagos, realizaremos una colaboración con agentes locales con el fin de abordar esta problemática a través de la creación de un pabellón textil realizado con dichos materiales, que hará de techo, el refugio para las actividades que proponen generar herramientas para el desarrollo de una economía circular textil destinada a la comunidad. Vamos a involucrar más formalmente a los miembros de la comunidad en una variedad de entornos, desde estudiantes universitarios y empresarios establecidos hasta mujeres que trabajan como porteadoras o vendedoras ambulantes, así como diseñadores y marcas internacionales en el diseño de productos circulares y la transformación de materiales. La propuesta planteada parte desde un inicio en cómo responder dentro de contexto territorial regional del África occidental donde se verifica la consecuencias del actual sistema de consumo y sobreproducción de materiales textiles generados para la demanda del mundo occidental.
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