en horas bajas an exhibition by Juan Antonio Cerezuela
curated by Alterdúo – Arianna Esposito and Marco Tondello
Espronceda Institute of Art & Culture
Inauguration: November 24, 2021 at 7:00 p.m.
Guided tour by books: December 04, 2021 at 5:30 p.m.
From November 24th to December 10th, 2021
C / d’Espronceda, 326 , Nave 4 y 5, 08027 Barcelona
www.espronceda.net | info@espronceda.net
Opening time Tuesday to Saturday: 4:00 p.m. – 7:00p.m.
Consult other hours by appointment
Espronceda Institute of Art & Culture presents en horas bajas, individual exhibition of the artist Juan Antonio Cerezuela (Cartagena, 1982) curated by Alterdúo, a collective composed of Arianna Esposito (Rome, 1993) and Marco Tondello (Padua, 1989), winners of the Residency Program for Art Curators 2021 organized by the same center.
en horas bajas approaches language and history as transformable matters, susceptible to aggression, catastrophes, being reduced to ruins and their subsequent redemption. The project takes as theoretical references, among others, Walter Benjamin and Karl Kraus.
The title comes from the expression “to be in low hours”, used by fishermen and sailors when the low tide does not allow them to set sail or fish. In more colloquial language, this saying is also used to indicate that something is not in its best moment or, in other words, that it is decaying.
The exhibition, which can be visited in Espronceda from November 24th to December 4th, 2021, brings together the artist’s most emblematic pieces together with newly created works and large installations, as well as small interventions in the space. All artistic production refers in turn to burned texts; writings used during dictatorial regimes to justify the burning of books; flammable materials turned to ash, charcoal, or waste that show up in their dormant state. en horas bajas ends with an action devised by the artist and Alterdúo entitled Guided tour by books which, through the interpretation of different quotes and texts, will present a new reading of the exhibition project.
All discourse is born, dies, and resurfaces. Sometimes it tends to be incendiary, other times it ends up in ruins. In any case, it never goes away.
There is a dichotomy, discussed by many authors, between the vision of language as an act of creation and, in turn, as an actor of the catastrophe. In its broadest sense, we can consider language as a place full of aggressions and wounds, sometimes oppressive or oppressed, that give rise to both the most creative beauty and the most destructive force.
en horas bajas an exhibition that presents, in the gloom, reflections that collect the legacy of our past to bring it to the present, prompting us to question what future we will build on its ruins.
Language sets fire. Language is ruin. Language is hope.
Juan Antonio Cerezuela (Cartagena, 1982), visual artist and researcher, currently residing at La Escocesa, is a Doctor in Visual and Intermediate Arts at the Faculty of Fine Arts of Valencia (2014) and, a Bachelor of Fine Arts at the University of Granada (2005 ). The discourse of his work is always analytical about language as structurality and as a sign group, addressing questions about narrative and fiction, about the way in which stories reach us and how hegemonic and power discourses are articulated.
Among the most recent exhibitions are: Blanco y Ceniza en 13ESPACIOarte (Seville, 2021), Subversió! Manifestacions perifèriques per a una història reversible (Born CCM, 2020), Paisatges desitjats (Arts Santa Mònica, 2020), ESC-OUT: Deviations of artistic practices in the public sphere (Fabra i Coats, 2019), The fireproof memory ( Gabarrón Foundation, Murcia, 2019), Full Blanks (CEART, Madrid, 2019). He was a finalist for the Ashurst Emerging Artist Prize Awards (London, 2019), received the 1st prize for Emerging Art of Sabadell (2017) and the 1st prize at the XXXI La Rioja Young Art Show (2015), among others. In 2020 he received the Grant for production in plastic and visual arts from the ICA of the Region of Murcia and the Grant for research and artistic experimentation from La Escocesa.
Alterdúo is a curatorial collective devised by Arianna Esposito (Roma, 1993) and Marco Tondello (Padua, 1989). His projects and research arise from the questioning of current realities, paying special interest in those emerging and marginal, in order to build networks and spaces of intersubjectivity between culture and community.
Both share an interest in contemporary and digital artistic practices, establishing their work based on two main axes: dialogue and process. Dialogue as a device of care and drive towards non-hegemonic collaborative experiences and the process as a constant action where to give rise to other possible beginnings.
As a duo, they have curated the exhibition #internetflags by Irma Marco at the Espai Souvenir gallery (2020), they have collaborated with L’Estruch de Sabadell in Dissonants, cicle de performance i tecnologia (2021) and have presented Entrañas: Carne de mi carne by María Alcaide in program 1 + 1 + 1 … of the Loop Festival 2021.
