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[20240809]

CÓMO DESCRIBIR A ALGUIEN QUE NO CONOCE LA LLUVIA, LA DICHA DE PISAR EL BARRO* by PAULINA MELLADO at GALERÍA GABRIELA MISTRAL [from 20240412 to 20240614]

[Photos: Paulina Mellado] [*How to describe to someone who doesn’t know rain the joy of stepping on mud]


What do you do, after you stop pretending?
[Dougald Hine, The Dark Mountain Project]

It needs to be just earth. And as for this, everyone has it under their feet.
It was so strange to feel alive on a living thing.
[Clarice Lispector]
Visitor,

This was the fertile land we couldn’t get to know. This space is like a capsule to an imprecise time, but thanks to recent studies, we’ve been able to date it to the year 2024 BTP (Before Total Predation), inviting you to engage with some of its mineral, vegetable, and geographical peculiarities, especially those that occurred in the southern hemisphere of the planet. Go ahead, dare to live this unique experience that has been so difficult for us to reproduce.

We recommend starting your visit by watching the videos in this room. Then head to the left side of the gallery. You are allowed and encouraged to touch the earth, smell it, lie your body on it, feel its textures and consistencies. Take it as if this identical fragment of the natural, highly organic substitute, were yours. It is, in fact, for you. We propose you take your time. Practice patience, contemplation, and “being.” This way, you can have a quality time with pleasant sensations, just as the inhabitants of our recent past enjoyed afternoons by rivers, lakes, and mountains sitting on the grass, however strange this may sound today, looking at the details of their landscapes.

If you feel warmth, don’t worry, it’s the common effect of a greenhouse. Unlike those previously used to cultivate vegetables and exotic plants, this one conserves a garden that is both colorful and nostalgic. Furthermore, that artificially organic interior could be dying over the duration of this experience. It’s part of the “natural” process.

We know that every testimony of the years when the earth existed as moist and biodiverse is a product of imagination and science fiction arising from the crisis we remain in. How to describe to someone who doesn’t know rain the joy of stepping on mud – an interactive and immersive simulation by the artist Paulina Mellado – is no exception. However, as an institution, we inaugurate this space to contribute to the history and memory of our community and, in this way, strengthen our bonds.

We hope you enjoy being in touch with the earth, Sincerely,

Céline Fercovic Year 51 ATP

In an exercise of futuristic nostalgia, Paulina Mellado explores how the beings of the future might recreate a natural landscape from their lack of knowledge, given the impossibility of experiencing nature in its wildest state. The exhibition space becomes a garden, an extravagant urban oasis, a space for contemplation within the already arid city where visitors can immerse themselves in a fantasy of what nature will be, and reflect on our past and present perception of it.

“Cómo describir a alguien que no conoce la lluvia, la dicha de pisar el barro”* invites us to think about the future. To engage our minds and imagine how, in a distant time, we will relate to what we today call “natural,” and how, with our hands and minds, we can create other, more colorful and friendly worlds. Through this sensory experience, we are reminded that our imagination is our most powerful tool, and that the first step to building other possible worlds is to imagine them.

*How to describe to someone who doesn’t know rain the joy of stepping on mud

Paulina Mellado (Temuco, Chile) holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from Universidad de Chile (2009), and a Master of Fine Arts from AKV St. Joost (2014), Den Bosch, the Netherlands. With a DiY attitude and the use of materials related to craft making, ceramics, fiberglass and others, her practice deals with the theme of landscape and “nature”. Her work, installations and sculptures, have been exhibited in diverse galleries, institutions and independent art spaces in Chile and abroad, such as: Patricia Ready Gallery (Santiago, CL), Hinterconti (Hamburg, DE) Instituto Tele Arte (Santiago, CL), LOCAL arte contemporáneo (Santiago, CL), Matca (Cluj-napoca, RO), Pavillon Tribschenhorn (Luzern, CH),  Galería XS (Santiago, CL), Club Solo (Breda, NL), among others. She has participated in multiple residency programs such as Achterhaus (Hamburg, DE), 51CTH ( Roskilde, DK), AiR Sandnes (Sandnes, NO) BilbaoArte ( Bilbao, ES), Mustarinda (Hyrynsalmi, FI) Kaus Australis (Rotterdam, NL) among others.

[Text: Céline Fercovic ]





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