I'll be waiting here 🙋

Dear people:

How are you? I feel it's been ages since I have not written to you (with the amount of things I always have to tell you) and events are happening. June has been gone for a while and the acceleration of time seems to be an open secret, can you feel it? Maybe less, if you are on holiday. In my last letter I told you that the world seemed like an explosion of light and colour. I was referring to the jacarandas blooming, but now it seems that the pandemic exploded again (how tiresome the little bug and its variants) so I send virtual hugs to those of you who are in quarantine, with snot running down your knees or feeling your body as if you had been run over by a truck. Patience and care, my dears.

Let me tell you first about the change of schedule so that we can get organised, ok? I'm very (very) sorry, but we have to postpone tomorrow's meeting with my dear Yannick Sánchez to this coming Sunday July 18 at 12 noon. In Retrospective of an Emerging Artist, Yannick will take the opportunity to share what he has been doing along his obstacle course as an artist because, despite appearances, he is a man of faith and believes in second (third and fourth) chances. I remember the day he told me that the exhibition, his first solo show, would have no theme and perhaps no works. "Like in Seinfeld, you know?" And I thought no, because I never saw it, but then he told me about moving his studio here, about opening the creative process to the public, about giving everything a twist and laughing at the world and at art and at himself first. So I thought it was a good idea, because we kind of need humour these days. So you can come and laugh with us next Sunday by booking here. And also make a note in your diary that on September 1 at 7 pm we'll be holding the closing opening of his project, Títol de l'exposició, which is being built up over the summer as the Art Nou festival for young talents progresses.

I am also thrilled to tell you that at the last edition of the Arts Libris fair, seven of the publications we presented were awarded. What a rush! Just as I say. So I would like to thank once again the jury for their support and generosity: Andrea Soto Calderón, Laura Pelayo González from the Reina Sofía Museum, Lucía C. Pino, Pepe Font de Mora from Foto Colectania, Antonio Alcaraz from Bellas Artes UPV and Moritz Kung, who took notice of this way of publishing on a slow fire. Thanks also to my dear Ámbar Amill, the creator of the graphics and logo of the room, for her help with the design of some of the winning books, and to Noemi Saia, for giving her all with me at the fair.

Below, as usual, some other ideas.

👉 I am also very happy to present Carmen M. Castañeda's work during the next Barcelona Gallery Weekend. Carmen transfers the hand embroidery techniques of haute couture to a conceptual and experimental framework, and investigates the fragility of memory with an abstract language. Time in layers of work, the repetition of the same gesture, slow processes and the study of different materials, whether or not they are specific to embroidery, have led this visual artist and needlework researcher to push the discipline to its very limits, to re-signify it and give it a new context. In this video for Radio 3's Desatados, she explains her work with meridian clarity, and you can see some of the works she has been preparing for the exhibition that opens on September 15 in the room.

👉 In the meantime, during the summer, maybe you feel like listening to something different. So if you'll allow me, I'd like to recommend the most special thing I've ever heard in podcast format (thank you, Mirentxu). De eso no se habla (in Spanish) is a wonder created by Isabel Cadenas Cañón and her great team to talk about silences, the stories behind them and what happens when we break them. There are seven episodes with a hair-raising prologue and an exquisite sound design for this narrative non-fiction podcast, halfway between chronicle, essay and documentary, which tries to join the dots between personal silences and collective silences. All yours.

🛣️ And today I say goodbye with a road trip. Because I imagine that sooner or later you will go on holiday, retreat from the hustle and bustle and travel miles to get back to the time you were given. The tune in this video clip is included in David Lynch's second album (The Big Dream, 2013), as a bonus track with Lykke Li. A single shot taken from the dashboard of the car that works like a mantra, beautiful in its simplicity, perfect and peaceful to sit in the car and get lost aimlessly. I guess for those of us who enjoy driving, the vast possibility of a desert road is the best image to empty our mind and take a break from ourselves. Have a happy summer. I'll be waiting for you here.

With love,
Chiquita