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Paolo Curti & Co. Gallery opens its
new space with a personal exhibition of the Cuban artist
Marta Maria Pérez Bravo. The choice of this artist come from a
careful consideration of the so called Third World
emergent situations and is part of the international
research on the contemporary art survey that the gallery
will pursue.
This is the first
Italian exhibition of the Cuban photographer, born in
L’Havana on 1959.
Marta Maria Pérez Bravo
has been using black-and-white photography as the sole
support for her work ever since the 1980's.From the early
small-format works to her larger-scale pieces her
cherished and hallowed assets are presents: her own body,
the syncretism of her culture and her search for meaning
and identity. Pérez Bravo uses her body as an altar, a
vessel, a gate, a temple or a bird-house, that is, as a
vivid metaphor of her dreams and visions.
For her, photography is
a way of fixing symbolic scenarios, in which she
constantly refers to the myths and rituals of Cuban
witchcraft, known as Santeria. Although she uses votive
offerings and other elements of popular lore.
The exhibition will have
14 large-scale pieces, as Todo lo tengo, todo me falta
(I've got everything. I'm lacking everything), Tiene la
llave del destino (I have the key of the destiny), Para
la entrega (For the giving), in which she appears
gathering the remains of her cropped hair in a white
sheet.
Marta Maria Pérez Bravo
has been invited to many group shows: as the Teatro
National of L'Havana in 1981, the first Havana Biennial
in 1984, the Dusseldorf Kusthalle in 1991, the Museum of
Contemporary Hispanic Art of New York in 1988, the Third
Havana Biennial in 1989, and recently the Vienna
Kunsthalle for the exhibition "Cuba: maps of desire".
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BOOKS | |
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Marta Maria Pérez Bravo
has been selected for "Cream: Contemporary Art in Culture",
Phaidon edition, London (1988),
a selection of one hundred artists who will cross the new millennium, by Rosa Martinez, one of the most attentive international contemporary art critic, who took part of the jury Venice Biennial international in 1999. | |
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Marta Maria Pérez Bravo
in conversation with
Rosa Martinez
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Rosa Martínez: Since the 80's, you have been using black
and white photography as the exclusive medium for your
work. Could you explain your choice? |
Marta Maria Pérez Bravo: I chose to use black and white
photography for my work because it is the aesthetic
resource that comes closest to documentation; with black
and white photography, you can capture an event that is
happening, you can represent a certain action. Due to
other formal characteristics of my work, this document
does not provide information about the specific time and
space where the event occurs or takes place. Black and
white photography is capable of giving the whole an
oneiric feeling, of producing associations with
apparitions and other aspects that do not belong to a
concrete reality. On the other hand, the world of
religion that my work refers to is a world where each and
every colour is charged with meaning. The aesthetics of
sacred and cult objects that are made reference to can be
extremely appealing in terms of colour, yet this appeal
often distracts from, or dilutes, the true meaning of the
objects. But that, the meaning, is precisely what I am
interested in; I want to bring out the very essence of
the object I recreate, without adulteration.
Paradoxically, however, every religious object I use is
made of specific materials and colours, although the
observer can only distinguish shades of grey. In terms of
the concept, the private ritual is also part of the work
- the use of colours is part of the meaning, it is a kind
of moral compromise with the subject.
from
"Cuba: los Mapas del Deseo" |
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