4 X 4 PROYECT
It starts in 2003 as a result of one of the worst economic crisis in Argentina. In Cordoba, as in other cities, it meant the overwhelming appearance of underemployment and precarious works, as the recollection and sale of paper and paperboard, made by “cardboard pickers” (“cartoneros”) on carts pulled by horses.Along with this, exile from family and friends for economic reasons, made me think of these animals as exiles to the “interior”. The horse, proud symbol of the prosperity in Argentine countryside, was another myth commissioned to resist a country with an imminent reconfiguration marked by social inequality and immobility.
The “Portraits” (2004) of horses simulated photographs intended for identity documents, blue background used for passports and copied the pose of equestrian paintings of the XVIII century pedigree horses, to bring also in mind that these are “Argentine horses” and also new “urban inhabitants”.
“Primavera” (Spring) (experimental video-loop 5 min. 2003), shows images that result from a video camera held between the eyes of a horse on his daily route of “cardboard picking” (“cartoneo”) by the city from the animal s point of view.
Primavera, 2004 Video 5 min, loop Edition: 3 + 1AP view video: http://youtu.be/cZ1wnkSTsT4
“Empotrados” (Embedded) (“Chronicle of an “accident” -2006, text and drawing) describes a failed photo shoot inside a family home in a suburb of the city of Cordoba. The animal is scrammed inside the house causing considerable damage.
“Objects in mirror are closer than They appear”, are snapshots in the streets of the city.
“Ejemplares” (Species) are cardboard picker horses posing in front of a painted background (in the manner of a photographer that takes souvenir pictures in Squares), in utopic attempt to return them to the “countryside”, reproducing works of a popular CЧrdoba painter of the early XX century, Egidio Cerrito, who was able to reflect his environment in response to the demand of paintings in the homes of middle class family of the 80’s, and included in its postcard version of the landscape, the ranch, the grassland and desolation of the moor. Horses also pose with their owners and, once more, there is a quote to equestrian painting of Renaissance that belongs to European aristocracy of the time.
Muñeca en un Cerrito, 2004 Video 1 min, loop Edition: 3+ 1AP View video: http://youtu.be/2ZIkBg_WoRQ