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First day of spring

Installation

"First day of spring" is a site specific installation produced for the show "Cómo se avanza en un sitio peligroso," organized by Taller León and displayed in an abandoned building in Santiago's downtown, where a factory of suitcases worked during 20th century. 22 artists participated in the show with works that ranged from painting and drawing to performance, video and installation. "Cómo se avanza en un sitio peligroso" was meant to open on October 19th, but should be postponed until December because of the chilean riot that began the day before. The show lasted 2 weeks in December of 2019. Santiago, Chile.

 

September 23th: the longest sunlight. At 8:53 the light begins to crawl in the wooden floor of the room. It leaves it at 13:09. By marks with little notes on them, I registered every 4 minutes the form projected by the sun through the window. The result is an absurd map of the movement of the sun in a period of 4 hours. It's useless. I took 24 moments of this map, marked on the floor with golden paper, as a reference to make 24 drawings: 24 forms drawn by the sun in the floor of the room are now golden paper drawings on 24 papers. The walls, made with an awl on them, holds the air. The forms move silently, circular. 4 hours of movement or 4 hours of stillness. Boring is the illusion that everything is static. If we stand still, we can see everything move.

 

"Everything has become unbearable to me, excepto life–the office, my house, the streets–even their opposite, if such a thing existed–everything overwhelms and oppresses me. Only the totality affords me relief. Yes, and part of it is enough to console me. A ray of sunlight falling endlessly into the dead office; a street cry that soars up to the window of my room; the existence of people, of climates and changes in the weather; the terrifying objectivity of the world…
Suddenly the ray of sun entered into me, by which I mean that I suddenly saw it… It was a bright stripe of almost colorless light cutting like a naked blade across the dark, wooden floor, enlivening everything around it, the old nails and the grooves between the floorboards, black-ruled sheets of nonwhiteness.
For minutes on end I observed the imperceptible effect of the sun penetrating into the still office… Prison pastimes! Only the imprisoned, with the fascination of someone watching ants, would pay such attention to one shifting ray of sunlight."

Fragment 356 of "Book of Disquiet" by Fernando Pessoa (ed. Jerónimo Pizarro, trans. Margaret Jull Costa).

    December 7th, 2019
    October 18th, 2019
    https://www.gasparalvarez.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/18_Teatinos_3-2.mp4
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    The thirst
    Ceramic installation
    Vicuña Mackenna Revisitado
    Painting
    Un amor para toda la vida
    Books
    Los viajes de Ulises
    Books
    Mal de época
    Books
    AMOR: Antología colectiva de poesía
    Books
    Curved patchair
    Music
    La otra hija
    Books
    Mientras dormías, cantabas
    Books
    Hermoso final
    Music
    XO
    Music
    Devices
    Ceramic installation
    Archive
    Why would I wanna freeze time?
    Ceramics
    Treasure's law
    Installation
    Time passes
    Ceramics
    Love grows
    Ceramis and paintings
    The prescription of love
    Drawings and ceramics
    Are filled with echoes
    Paintings
    How to walk on fire
    Drawings and paintings
    Wild Palms
    Paintings
    Scene reconstruction
    Paintings
    Fools gold/Missing someone
    Paintings
    Stand still above the ocean
    Paintings
    What matters most is how well you walk through the fire
    Paintings
    How to be pulled by the current
    Paintings
    None is the number
    Drawings

    © 2023 Gaspar Álvarez R. | Pintor y ceramista | Chiloé, Chile