El buen lugar, 2007
Site-specific installation for the Church of San Juan de Amandi, Villaviciosa. Neon sign, 20 lightboxes, 2 photographs on aluminium
Photo: Piru de la Puente
The result of an intense working process lasting severalmonths, this installation draws on the enduring connection between the specific creative expression of Romanesque architecture and the physical, cultural and human space in which it is inscribed and its ongoing dialogue with the visualcreative forces of the moment.
Exploring this heritage in the well-defined geographicalframework of Villaviciosa and its area of influence, broughtto the surface the existence of constructive typologies andiconographic repertoires whose interpretation over thecenturies has forced a new reflection on their value froma contemporary gaze within the context of the symbolic complex of identities. Photographic and sound materialsare extracted from the relationship between place-memory reading and its interpretation from the premises of cultural heritage, informing a mosaic of identities mirroring the symbiosis of human collectives with the visual manifestation closest to their cultural memory, and hence their selective expression here through art.
Two series of portraits, one of the “guardians” of thisheritage, the individuals in charge of the custody and openingof the buildings; and the second of infantes, children andyoung people engaged in recreations of motifs taken fromthe monuments, are combined with manipulated images of Romanesque art which is taken as the central axis of the project and the reflection of an identification that goes beyond the received way of looking at heritage from the past.
