[*Back at the end of 2019, a group of eight called SOMOS (or ‘SOMOS Mais’) formed in São Paulo to coordinate activities for December 1, International AIDS Day. The idea at first was that a collective might form to continue working together on our HIV-related artworks after the big holiday; however, the group didn’t stay together. A sweet event, Sarau Transante transpired on November 30th and members walked together the following day on São Paulo’s AIDS Walk. At the time I was unsure if anything had been ‘gained’ by all the effort that went into the group formation and its lone event; I reflected on our initiative in Using one ‘project’ to see another. Today, though, I can see some (new) things that I personally learned from the process. And, that’s nice! xo Todd]
LTIH: Do you prefer being called Sergio or El Santo?
ES: You can call me anything, I like both, Sergio is the name that my parents gave me, and El Santo is the name that I gave to my work, I’ll tell you a little bit more about the story of El Santo.
I believe it is important to start by telling you that when I was very little my mother would scold me, saying in an ironic way: “you are a saint, you never do anything, absolutely nothing.” Hehehe. In our culture saints are important, and I confess that ever since I was a little boy I really liked the idea of saints as characters, beyond the religious, I like to think that there can exist beings with some type of magic power or presence, with a sensibility that can change things, make things, or achieve things. In religion, saints, and even God himself, are like superheroes who give their all for a better world. I think it is very beautiful for one to believe in something, and even to believe in something in order to live. So I got the idea that the saint could be this character that lives in me and that is manifested through art and drawing. Because I need to believe in him, in something. And I believe that that is how the story of this character, or trademark, started in my art… And my saint really has fulfilled me, because I feel like, and I always tell my students, that I live the best version of Sergio, doing what I like best.
LTIH: You work in ceramics. Do you work in other media?
ES: I think that my work goes from illustration all the way to ceramics, or from ceramics all the way to illustration, it is a path that mixes up all the time, that comes together, that shows distances and parallels. I studied Graphic Design, and believe that that is very present in my work.
LTIH: I met you on a trip to Bogotá to visit Luciérnagas, a laboratory and project convened by Daniel Santiago Salguero. We met at the culmination or final ‘performance’ of the ten laboratories staged at the city’s Botanical Gardens. I made a joke about the ceramic penis pin you were wearing and learned that you had made it. You make ceramics at a studio where you also teach, El Santo Taller de Cerámica. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘operation’? What happens there?
ES: EL SANTO Taller de Cerámica is a space for creation, with its key driving force being ceramics. It is made up by Sergio and by all of the super beautiful and cool people who participate in the studio, working or taking classes, and it is SUPER important to make that clear, because the space is not a private room in which the artist makes his/her own works completely independently, and almost cloistered. In the way that I work, the participants give it life and contribute to having the studio reverberate throughout the neighborhood. The networks that are built with the students, friends, artists, and different people who intervene in the day to day of the studio, all allow for it to continue existing, alive, and happy, offering a space like what I am describing, magic in how it can work our inner selves and our thoughts while we are being creative.
Ceramics is full of processes, the nature of the material demands a series of time periods, which teaches us one of the things that is most difficult for us humans: to have patience. Above all in times like this. Before this crisis, it seems like we never had time for anything, and that we needed everything immediately. In art, that is very difficult, artistic and creative practices are full of understandings and processes with materials that you work on through a time of reflection. This is something fascinating about art, because it always demands time, and is a great lesson. Ceramics is no exception, it obligates you to work the material almost from zero, and if you don’t have ceramic paste or clay already, it is literally from zero.
LTIH: You are based in Bogotá, but from another part of Colombia. Can you remind me, and when did you move to the capital?
ES: I am from Cartagena, from the Colombian Caribbean. For me the move to Bogotá was very important. In Cartagena I felt very lost and out of place, I did not feel like I was part of anything, I wanted to speak through my work but could not find the voice. Of course, at this point, I did not know that these things are built with time. But I did know that I had to do something, a change that would produce a movement, and without a doubt, Bogotá was my best decision. In one way or another, I ended up setting up and forming a collective that would change my life, and together with another friend, my first serious collective project took off. In it, I learned many important things that I apply day to day, such as the love for this profession and the discipline that this loving relationship entails. I learned and learn each day to resist, to work with people, to be generous, and to try to be generous again the next day, with myself and with others. I learn everyday to believe in myself, to listen to myself and to value all of the decisions that I have taken and that have brought me here, as I have already said, living the best version of Sergio. I try to give this to people who come into contact with my studio and with my work in general, more than just saying in detail everything that I think and feel, more than just teaching the techniques and secrets that I have come to know about the material throughout these 11 years with the students. I want my work to offer ways, opinions, diverse situations, emotions, and possibilities of coming closer to a better version of ourselves. We construct this by working on our inner selves, through creativity.
LTIH: Your work is nice … I pick up a lot of data when I look at your INSTA page (similar to our visit). Your work is sweet, ironic and political at once. Can you say what your politics are?
ES: Thank you! I really like it that you say its effect is sweet, ironic and political. I think that there is nothing more political than knowing how to express the various situations that surround us in our lives, and that is precisely where my work comes from. It is about how this 36 year old gay costeño lives in a country like Colombia, with the music that I like, my friends, popular sayings, things that I do not like, things that I do not agree with, things that we can work on, relationships. I think it is very important to generate, through different situations in life, actions that generate positive changes. For this, it is crucial that the things that surround you also reaffirm this purpose, for improvements in your world and in the world that surrounds you. When we change positively, we also affect the other, and then the other, and then the other, so in a country like Colombia, with a history of war and violence for more than 50 years, it is very important to know how to say: ‘no more!’ This is not okay, I am not going to be quiet, I do not want to be a witness, I do not want to participate in this violence, and I want to understand that we cannot hurt someone else for thinking differently, we cannot silence someone else because we do not like what he/she says, we cannot make someone else disappear because he/she is completely different from me. I cannot forget and leave aside someone else, because I want to control him/her completely and have it all to myself. We need to, as a society, generate a dialogue that permits us to understand and respect others’ many different situations, and bring the tools that we have over to what is possible, in order to be agents of change, positive change. Through simple gestures such as having solidarity with others and with yourself, or through our work, generating questions, emotions, reflection.
As a matter of fact, what better moment than the one that we are currently going through, to have us realize how fragile we are, that we all need a little bit of help, and some people a little bit more. As the lucky or unlucky people that we can become or already are, we realize that there are many things that are important and many that aren’t. We realize that we need each other and that we need to work so that things can be a least a little bit better. Because I believe in this. I do the work that I do, and make the pieces that I make, always with something positive, either in how it is elaborated, or by inserting some humor or sweetness that moves the spectator. For me, this is very important, and I have to confess that it is also the way that I like to approach people. I think that humor and sweetness encompass many important things that are directly related to intelligence and politics. I believe that it is the best way to use plastic tools with a critical and positive meaning.
LTIH: And would you say that El Santo Taller de Cerámica is a political ‘space’?
ES: Definitely, yes! It is a space of resistance through art, which works with people’s creativity for the construction of positive internal landscapes.
LTIH: Can you tell us something new you are working on (maybe a collaboration with another artist)?
ES: Sure, at this moment, besides working on my own pieces and moving the studio, I am making a piece with Fernando Arias, a Colombian artist, who is important for his political and activist content; I am also in a project that I am super in love with. Well, first I want to say that I have a super cool collective with some friends, called “Colectivo El Engaño,” and together we are working with the Red Comunitária Trans, in a project called TRANSMEMORIA, and as the name says, we work with trans memories of people who have been assassinated or violated for being Trans, for being prostitutes, and for the different circumstances that the guild finds itself under in society, in the city of Bogotá, more precisely in the Santa Fe neighborhood.
I would like to tell you that to me, LA RED COMUNITÁRIA TRANS is incredible, the work they do is fantastic, how they do it, always with strength, intelligence, and without fear. They are always on their feet, always resting with joy and sensuality, and that moves me, it makes me passionate. I consider myself an ally and fan of the TRANS fight. First because it is completely violent and unjust, the fact that society arbitrarily does not allow you to be who you are or who you want to be, it seems to me like that violates all of a person’s fundamental rights. So, ever since we came into contact with them through the Engaño, we have been very moved by many things that we had ignored, and we have been fascinated with their strength and resistance. So with the Engaño, we have done some ceramic tiles that commemorate life, death, and in some way, the same neighborhood as a place of resistance. These tiles were taken from the neighborhood, at the exact spots where many girls were assassinated, in places where violence has been used against them, and places that are important to them for what they represent and for resistance. We have done this trans-prostitute-artistic action of memory and re-signification twice, and it’s been incredible for many reasons. Because we have worked together, because we have created networks. Because we have come together to leave a precedent saying that we have not forgotten our fallen sisters who we know have been assassinated, although the majority of the crimes are under a false silence. We are now more unified. We are speaking and screaming together that life is to be respected, that trans people’s lives are to be respected, and that no one has the right to impose violence onto them, no one has the right to forbid you from being who you want to be. Personally, I have learned to know and understand many very important things that I did not see before, and that have truly changed my life in a very positive way, giving me strength. The girls always fill you with empowerment and strength, so to surround myself and work with them through Engaño has been very beautiful and transformative. It fills me with a lot of pride and I feel very very happy to be part of something super magic, and for me it is moving and beautiful that they also recognize me as an ally.
I think that together we can form a voice at the volume that is necessary for the love revolution.
BEST REGARDS AND KISSES!!!!
_______________________________
ES
LTIH: Do you prefer being called Sergio or El Santo?
ES: Puedes decirme de cualquier forma, ambas me gustan, Sergio es el nombre que me dieron mis padres y El santo es el nombre que le di yo a mi trabajo, te contaré un poquito sobre la historia de EL Santo.
Creo que es importante empezar contando que cuando yo estaba muy pequeño y mi madre me regañaba siempre me decía de manera irónica: “eres un santo, nunca haces nada, nadita nada” jejeje. En nuestra cultura los santos son muy importantes y confieso que desde pequeño me gustó mucho la idea de los Santos, como personajes, más allá de lo religioso, me gusta pensar que pueden existir seres con algún tipo de poderes o presencias mágicas, con una sensibilidad que puede cambiar las cosas, hacer cosas o lograr cosas, en la religión católica los santos y hasta el mismísimo Dios son como unos superhéroes que lo dan todo por un mundo mejor, de todo eso me parece muy bonito que uno crea en algo y me parece además vital creer en algo para poder vivir, entonces me hice la idea que el Santo podía ser este personaje que vive en mí y que se manifiesta atreves del arte y diseño, en principio por qué yo necesito creer en él, en algo.
Y creo que así empieza la historia de este personaje o marca con el arte… Y mira que mi Santo me ha cumplido por qué yo siento y siempre cuento a mis estudiantes, que vivo la mejor versión de Sergio, haciendo lo que más me gusta.
LTIH: You work in ceramics. Do you work in other media?
ES: Yo creo que mi trabajo va desde la ilustración hasta la cerámica, o desde la cerámica hasta la ilustración, es un camino que se mezcla todo el tiempo, que se junta, que muestra distancias y situaciones paralelas. Yo estudié Diseño gráfico y creo que es un hecho que es un hecho que está muy presente en mi trabajo.
LTIH: I met you on a trip to Bogotá to visit Luciérnagas, a laboratory and project convened by Daniel Santiago Salguero. We met at the culmination or final ‘performance’ of the ten laboratories staged at the city’s Botanical Gardens. I made a joke about the ceramic penis pin you were wearing and learned that you had made it. You make ceramics at a studio where you also teach, El Santo Taller de Cerámica. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘operation’? What happens there?
ES: EL SANTO taller de cerámica es un espacio de creación que tiene como motor principal la cerámica. Está conformado por Sergio y por toda la gente super bonita y bacana (like cool) que participa en el taller, trabajando o tomando clases, y esto es SUPER importante dejarlo claro, por qué este espacio no es una habitación privada donde un artista trabaja sus obras completamente independiente y casi enclaustrado. De la manera en la que yo trabajo, los participantes le dan vida y contribuyen a que el taller pueda latir atreves del barro, las redes que se construyen con los estudiantes, amigos, artistas y diferentes personas que intervienen en el día a día del taller permiten que el taller siga en pie, siga vivo y feliz ofreciendo un espacio como digo yo, mágico en el que se puede trabajar el interior y el pensamiento con y mientras somos creativos.
La cerámica está llena de procesos, el material exige por naturaleza una serie de tiempos que enseñan algunas de las cosas que más nos cuesta a nosotros los humanos, y es tener paciencia, sobre todo en esas épocas y valga la pena decirlo así, que solíamos vivir antes de esta crisis, parecía que nunca teníamos tiempo para nada y que necesitábamos todo para ya, de entrada eso en el arte es muy difícil, las prácticas artísticas y creativas están llenas de entendimientos y procesos con los materiales que se trabaja y momentos de reflexión. Eso del arte es fascinante porqué siempre exige tiempo y es una gran lección, y la cerámica no es la excepción, te obliga a trabajar el material, casi desde cero y si no tienes pasta cerámica o barro, desde cero literal.
LTIH: You are based in Bogotá, but from another part of Colombia. Can you remind me, and when did you move to the capital?
ES: Yo soy de Cartagena, del caribe Colombiano, para mí el cambió a Bogotá fue super importante. En Cartagena me sentía muy perdido y desubicado, no me sentía parte de nada, quería hablar con mi trabajo pero no encontraba la voz. Claro en ese momento yo no sabía que esas cosas se construyen con tiempo , pero si supe que debía hacer algo, un cambio que produjera un movimiento y sin duda Bogotá fue mi mejor decisión, de una u otra forma terminé armando y formando un colectivo que cambiaría mi vida y junto con otro amigo arrancó mi primer proyecto en colectivo serio, donde aprendí muchas cosas importantes que aplico día a día, como el amor por esta profesión y la disciplina que implica esta relación amorosa, aprendí y aprendo cada día a resistir, a trabajar con la gente, a ser generoso, y a tratar al día siguiente de ser nuevamente generoso, conmigo y con los demás, y aprendo todos los días a creer en mí, a escucharme y a valorar todas las decisiones que he tomado y qué me tienen aquí, como ya lo dije viviendo la mejor versión de Sergio. Y eso intento dar a las personas que tienen contacto con mi taller y con mi trabajo en general, más allá de contar con cada pieza lo que pienso y siento, más allá de enseñar las técnicas y secretos que conozco del material a lo largo de estos 11 años con los estudiantes, quiero que mi trabajo ofrezca maneras, opiniones, situaciones diversas, emociones y posibilidades de acércanos a una mejor versión de sí mismos. Eso lo construimos trabajando nuestro interior con creatividad.
LTIH: Your work is nice … I pick up a lot of data when I look at your INSTA page (similar to our visit). Your work is sweet, ironic and political at once. Can you say what your politics are?
ES: Gracias! me gusta mucho cuando dices que es dulce e irónico y político en su defecto, creo que de entrada no hay nada más político que saber expresar las situaciones diversas que nos rodean en nuestra vida y precisamente de eso va mi trabajo, de cómo vive este costeño gay de 36 años en un país cómo Colombia, en la música que me gusta, en los amigos, en los dichos populares, en las cosas que no me gustan, en las cosas con las que no estoy de acuerdo, en las cosas que podemos trabajar, en las relaciones. Yo creo que es muy importante generar a través de las diferentes situaciones de la vida acciones que generen cambios positivos, para esto es clave que las cosas que te rodeen también reafirmen ese propósito en pro de mejoras a tu mundo y al mundo que te rodea. Cuando cambiamos positivamente afectamos también positivamente al otro y el otro al otro, entonces en un país cómo Colombia con una historia de guerra y violencia de más de 50 años es muy importante saber decir, no más! eso no está bien, no voy a callar, no quiero ser cómplice, no quiero participar de esa violencia y entender que no podemos agredir al otro por pensar diferente. No podemos silenciar al otro porque no me gusta lo que dice, no podemos desaparecer al otro porque es completamente diverso a mí, no podemos marginar a los otros por qué sus decisiones y privilegios son diferentes a los míos. No puedo olvidar y dejar de lado al otro porque quiero controlarlo todo y quiero que todo sea para mí. Necesitamos como sociedad generar un dialogo que nos permita entender y respetar las situaciones diversas de los demás y aportar con las herramientas que tengamos en lo posible para ser agentes de cambios, cambios positivos, a través de gestos sencillos como ser solidario con los demás y conmigo mismo o a través de nuestro trabajo generando preguntas, emociones, reflexión.
Inclusive qué mejor momento que el que estamos viviendo para darnos cuenta de lo frágiles que somos, que todos necesitamos un poco de ayuda y algunas personas un poco más, de lo afortunados o desafortunados que podemos llegar hacer o somos, nos damos cuenta que hay muchas cosas importantes y muchas que no, nos damos cuenta que nos necesitamos y necesitamos trabajar para que las cosas estén al menos, un poquito mejor. Porque creo en eso, hago el trabajo que hago y hago las piezas que hago, siempre con algo positivo. Ya sea por la manera en la que está elaborado o porque encierre algo de humor o ternura que logre mover al espectador, para mí esto es muy importante y debo confesar que además es la manera en que me gusta acercarme a la gente. Pienso que el humor y la ternura encierran muchas cosas importantes relacionadas directamente con la inteligencia y la política, creo que es la mejor manera de utilizar las herramientas plásticas con sentido crítico y positivo.
LTIH: And would you say that El Santo Taller de Cerámica is a political ‘space’?
ES: Definitivamente si! es un espacio de resistencia a través del arte, que trabaja con la creatividad de las personas para la construcción de paisajes internos positivos.
LTIH: Can you tell us something new you are working on (maybe a collaboration with another artist)?
ES: Claro, en este momento además de estar trabajando en piezas mías y estar moviendo el taller, estoy haciendo una pieza con Fernando Arias, artista colombiano, importante por su contenido político y activista; también estoy en un proyecto que me tiene super enamorado, bueno, primero quiero contar que yo tengo un colectivo super chévere con unos amigos que se llama “Colectivo El Engaño” y juntos estamos trabajando con la Red Comunitaria Trans en un proyecto que se llama TRANSMEMORIA, y como lo dice su nombre, hacemos memoria Trans a diferentes personas que han sido asesinadas y violentadas por ser Trans, por ser putas y por diferentes circunstancias en las que se encuentra el gremio en la sociedad, en la ciudad de Bogotá, más exactamente en el Barrio Santa Fe. Quisiera contar que a mí LA RED COMUNITARIA TRANS me parece increíble, me parece fantástico el trabajo que hacen, como lo hacen, siempre con fuerza, inteligencia, con o sin miedo siempre están de pie, siempre resistiendo con alegría y sensualidad y esto me emociona, me apasiona, me considero un aliado y fan de la lucha TRANS. De entrada porque es completamente violento e injusto que la sociedad arbitrariamente no te deje ser quién eres o quien quieres ser, eso me parece que atenta contra todos los derechos fundamentales de una persona. Así que desde que tuvimos contacto con ellas en el Engaño nos sentimos muy tocados por un montón de cosas que ignorábamos y quedamos fascinados con su fuerza y resistencia. Entonces hicimos con el engaño unas baldosas en cerámica que conmemoran la vida, la muerte y de alguna manera el mismo barrio como lugar de resistencia, estas baldosas las pegamos en el barrio en los lugares exactos donde fueron asesinadas muchas chicas, en sitios de violencia contra ellas y en lugares importantes para ellas por lo que representan y por resistencia. Esta acción trans puteril artística de memoria y resignificación la hemos hecho dos veces y ha sido increíble, por muchas razones. Porque hemos trabajado juntos, porque hemos hecho redes, porque nos hemos unido para dejar un precedente diciendo que no olvidamos a las hermanas caídas, que sabemos que fueron asesinadas y aunque la mayoría de los crímenes están en un falso silencio ahora estamos más unidos, hablando y gritando juntos que la vida se respeta, que la vida de las personas Trans se respeta y que nadie tiene derecho a violentarlas, nadie tiene derecho a prohibirte a ser quien tú quieres ser. Personalmente, he aprendido a conocer y a entender muchas cosas muy importantes que antes no veía y que de verdad me han cambiado la vida de manera muy positiva, me he llenado de fuerza, las chicas siempre te llenan de empoderamiento y fuerza, entonces llegar a acercarme y trabajar con ellas con el engaño ha sido muy bonito y transformador y me llena de mucho orgullo y me siento muy muy feliz de ser parte de algo super mágico, y para mí es muy emocionante y bonito que ellas también me reconozcan como un aliado.
Creo que juntos podemos formar una voz con el volumen necesario para la revolución del amor.
¡¡¡¡SALUDOS Y BESOS!!!!
Pictures by: Sergio El Santo/El Santo Taller de Cerámica
“De Gris a POSITHIVO” Documental Autobiográfico de Juan De La Mar que hace parte de Luv ’til it Hurts, se encuentra seleccionado para “Media Library 2020 – Visions Du Réel, Festival Internacional de Cine de Nyon”.
“De Gris a POSITHIVO,” an Autobiographical Documentary by Juan De La Mar, who is part of Luv ’til it Hurts, has been selected for the “Media Library 2020 – Visions Du Réel, Festival Internacional de Cine de Nyon.”
Además, con este documental hemos sido seleccionadxs en festivales de cine LGBT como “CinHomo”, “Andalesgai”, “El Lugar Sin Límites”, “Yukasa”; y nos ha permitido hablar en diferentes contextos sobre el VIH.
In addition, with this documentary we have also been selected to LGBT film festivals, such as “CinHomo,” “Andalesgai,” “El Lugar Sin Límites,” “Yukasa;”
Los invitamos a ver y compartir este tráiler y a preguntarse ¿qué harían si mañana fuera su último día de VIHda?
We invite you to watch and share this trailer, and to ask yourself: what would you do tomorrow if it was the last day of your life (VIHda)?
Eric Rhein Communion with Oak (self-portrait) 1998, gelatin silver print, 20”x16”
I walk with the shadows
of the men I’ve known,
and loved, and tasted,
and feel, even still,
the warmth of their breath
against my skin.
Eric Rhein
1992
_____________________
Eric Rhein is an artist living and working in New York. He has exhibited widely in the United States and abroad, and has been reviewed in the New York Times, Huffington Post, ARTnews, Vanity Fair, and Art in America. He is included in the Smithsonian Archives of American Art’s Visual Arts and the AIDS Epidemic: An Oral History Project. He is a founding member of Visual AIDS Archive Project, and more of his work can be found on his Artist+ Registry page.
Eric Rhein: Lifelines is the forthcoming, full-length book on his work, to be published by Institute 193. This monograph will feature a series of luminous photographs showing the artist with friends and lovers, in an era when intimacy and sensuality between queer men was as central to their wellbeing as any medicine.
Image: ‘Hummingbirds’ (Installation of 6), 2016, by artist Eric Rhein
I wanted to elaborate more on the concept of ’transcendence’, mostly because I have some reservations about it. BUT, the fact that HIV is a disease that you live with took me to the place of transcendence. I departed from Eric’s work and paid especial attention to it. The aesthetics of the drawings helped to describe such transcendence in the LTIH project. (more about it later)
[…]
For me, the starting point for a reflection about HIV and stigma is to re-situate us in what it means to be ‘healthy’ and what it means to be ‘ill’. I’d talk in terms of health ’state’ rather than ’status’, meaning that state entails more than the exclusively physical condition of a body. ’Status’ objectifies, quantifies and causally determines the body—thus, allowing the commodification of it—, creating a sort of ‘snapshot’ of an organism. A body is certainly an organism and, as such, it is its dynamic properties that make our (changing) existence possible. I want to consider existence as ‘being-in-the-world’ in a joint project, so ‘being-in-the-world-with-others’.
I turned to a book called Existential Medicine (2018), which interrogates the current/dominant view on health and illness within medical thinking. I thought of what Todd told about the meds and how the impersonal and instrumental framework of the health system treats/control bodies reinforcing the stigma of certain diseases like HIV (I’m generalizing, but I do think that medical thinking reinforces stigma 90% of the time, including when it manipulates genes to design enhanced bodies like Lulu and Nana)… In one of the texts, which uses HIV as example (I’ve attached the article), the authors argue that our current model of medicine/health system does not acknowledge the existential character of the human body, ie. the human body as expression of its intersubjectivities and the fact that a body is not only an organism, but also the means of one’s existence, in the sense that a body is the existence of an experiencing subject. This phenomenological approach goes together with the necessity of treating the ‘person’ and not only consider the reductive view of the body as detached from the context of mutual existence in the world. […]
After all of this, I tried to be more objective and start to write a ’statement’ by raising the questions:
What is Luv ‘Til It Hurts? It is when virtual pasts and futures are erased from a lifetime and what remains is a thin stroke of obliterating gestures. This is the trail of a new existence. The thinnest part through which life can be recognized. It is the abbreviation of the normative and the construction of a spatiality dedicated to the encounter of stigma and love.
Why the body? The body is forgotten in a state of health. When a disruption occurs in the body, it rapidly changes our awareness of it.
What is the duration of an epidemic? How does a never-ending-epidemic look like? Epidemics draw on the concept of being ill. Every disease is a disruption in the balance of a body and, more importantly, this ill body disturbs the normative context of the other bodies and their shared functions in public life or in a society.
Despite the fact that HIV evolves from the inside, the narratives of sickness develop from the outside, although an environment comprises of both. LTIH addresses the comprehension of a body beyond its organic, ‘causally determined entity in the physical world’, but as an imbroglio of metabolic exchanges between inside phenomena and outside circumstances.
Proposition of a framework for transcendence
What is transcendence?
Transcending is the impossibility of living in one of the poles of dichotomies like life and death, health and illness.
Much of the stigma on HIV still resonates the death sentence that comes with the diagnosis—even if today we can speak about preventive methods and treatment and an undetectable viral load… living with HIV expresses more than being alive or dead.
Is transcending an escape? No, transcending is to open a breach in the stiff portion of soil underneath our feet. The middle is not something in between, but it is produced by the impossibility of living in one pole of a dichotomy. It is not to be an actual object or subject of something, but the very process of subjectification.
It is to transform memory into future-making and what comes next into one more thread to bind. It is to stay with the contour of things, instead of reinforcing the contrast of positive and negative sides (Eric’s work).
Am I proposing a sort of immanent transcendence? Maybe…
[On the occasion of Love Positive Women 2020, a project by Jessica Lynn Whitbread and partners around the world, Colombian graphic artist, Power Paola offered some new Spanish-language designs, which can be used for years to come as well. I met Power Paola through Daniel Santiago Salguero, who convened the Luciérnagas laboratory. Thanks Daniel and Power Paola!! xo Todd]
[*Early this year I got the chance to talk to Vinicius Couto in São Paulo about three strands of his work. The article contains images from a performance he made in São Paulo, Rio and Cairo. I was particularly interested in his idea of getting HIV+ people together, as well as what he says on ‘aesthetics’. His initial interview took place before COVID19, and I asked for clarification on his idea for getting people together a few days ago. xo Todd]
PT
TLL: Você disse que o seu trabalho tem três áreas. Eu lembro de duas: Visitar países que não permitem pessoas positivas de entrar, como o Egito; E criar ou participar de uma rede de pessoas positivas? (Esqueci: eram pessoas ou artistas?) … Você poderia explicar as três e talvez falar sobre as conexões que existem entre elas?
VC: Sim, hoje, pra além da [I=I] – trabalho que me introduziu no meio da performance, tenho mais 2 projetos:
O primeiro é que nos próximos 10 anos, pretendo hackear os outros 47 países que restringem de alguma forma a minha entrada/permanência enquanto corpo positivo, independente de estado sorológico. A abertura se deu no Egito.
Ainda não sabemos exatamente como vai ser a minha atuação, mas a princípio sabemos que será uma visita com entrevistas e o meu estigma (o figurino de cabelos) ocupando a cidade. Como se ficasse explícito que por mais que exista restrições de entrada, a Aids existe em todos os lugares.
O segundo é um projeto de 3 meses, ainda não encabeçado, que vai promover encontros a partir de um convite feito por lambe-lambes distribuídos pelas ruas da cidade. Nos encontros eu pretendo propor conteúdos que abordem questões positivas, entre filmes, informativos, performances e o que mais acontecer, com foco em conteúdos brasileiros e ao término eu proponho uma roda de conversa junto com um questionário que levantará dados pra uma performance de reprodução de corpos.
E o trabalho que já existe é a I=I que é anual e gradativa, a cada ano são adicionados mais 365- frascos condizentes aos meus dias de tratamento desde que iniciei.
Além desses tenho um outro projeto ainda em especulação que é uma “cura dor ria posithiva”, onde convidarei artistas positivos a proporem novos olhares e possibilidades de visões desafogadas de tristeza e morte. Acredito que vem chegando o momento de pensarmos a luta positiva com menos dor e mais força.
TLL: Na verdade eu queria entender a sua prática artística. Não sei se você tem um ‘artist statement’ ou algum texto sobre essa sua ‘viagem’ artística. Por favor, poderia nos falar abertamente sobre o que você faz na vida .. e com a arte?
VC: Definitavamente, não tenho nenhuma estratégia nem pontos de partida. A minha vida sempre foi definida pelo acaso. Nunca consegui programar muitas coisas, talvez pela falta de grana ou até mesmo pela minha personalidade.
No trabalho, escolhi investigar na arte, na moda e no cinema, corpos não normativos. Iniciei essa investigação em 2010, quando abri mão muitas vezes de trabalhar no meio branco/rico para me voltar a projetos que realmente fariam diferenças pra mim e pra outres.
Não acho que devemos protocolar o trabalho como “ganha pão”. O prazer deve se dar nas articulações profissionais. É uma pena pensar que, talvez no Brasil, ainda que exista, essa investigação ainda é pouco valorizada. Em teoria, talvez, eu tenha escolhido o prazer ao invés da riqueza. Tive oportunidades de trabalhar com as mais poderosas mas abri mão por não me ver presente em nenhum daqueles espaços. E quando veio o HIV, eu tinha duas escolhas, o silêncio e a possibilidade de desestruturar esse mesmo. Escolhi abrir e nada mais óbvio do que colocar meu próprio corpo em questão. Daí se deu na performance. Não sou um corpo acadêmico e nem defendo a academia. Acho que vivemos um declínio acadêmico que não possibilita a vivência das ruas, por exemplo. Defendo a minha investigação e interesse pelo olhar, pela vivência e principalmente pelo trânsito. A academia nos coloca em lugares muito teóricos mas a vivência é o que nos faz ter conclusões plausíveis sobre qualquer assunto. A verdade é que uma precisa da outra e eu escolhi a outra.
Bienal de Cairo (I=I Cairo) Fotos: otimokarater
TLL: Eu me lembro de uma resposta sua sobre estética durante a nossa visita, e tenho interesse especificamente nessa linha de pensamento. Você pode falar um pouco mais sobre isso?
VC: Legal que isso te marcou.
Defendo a estética como forma de informação, mas ainda assim ela fica sublime e aberta para conclusões diversas. Quando penso em arte/HIV, penso em trabalho com profundidade de informação, ainda que já vivemos há muito tempo com a questão do HIV/AIDS, o que se dá numa crescente epidemia é a falta de informação. É uma loucura vermos que ainda não temos políticas públicas efetivas no brasil e acho que a potencialidade vai se dar em novas ferramentas. É aí que entra a arte. Porém, por mais sublime que se apresente, a gente nunca vai conseguir se desvencilhar da informação, ela é o que vai fazer, talvez, um dia, a gente dar conta de introduzir a não conclusão em um trabalho de arte posithiva. Antes disso, defendo que todas as abordagens devam ser baseadas e introdutivas de informação. Esse ao menos é o meu formato de trabalho. Quando também defendo o “discurso popular” como o jeito mais abrangente e efetivo de transformação, eu penso nos meus, na minha tia que mora lá longe, naqueles que não aprenderam a buscar a informação. Somos um país com indução de informação e com altos índices de audiência nos grandes canais de TV, aqui as pessoas tem as TVs de última geração pra assistir a TV Globo, por exemplo. Ainda que já tenhamos acessos globais, estamos longe do domínio da tecnologia e da consciência de buscar fontes que realmente tragam dados concretos.
TLL: Por favor, você poderia falar mais sobre a sua visita ao Cairo (Egito)? Sobre como foi morar lá por um tempo e se envolver com a cause do HIV por lá. Tenho curiosidade sobre qual foi a reação do público durante a Bienal de Cairo.
VC: Ah, o Egito!
A Bienal do Cairo foi o espaço que me escolheu pra abrir a minha condição de posithivo. Antes disso eu estive 2 anos formulando a minha abertura. Ensaiei uma performance que se chama “libertar-ser” com curadoria da Susana Guardado pra um projeto que se chama Prazer é Poder, no Rio, lugar onde contrai o HIV. Nessa performance o meu corpo era apenas um estigma. Os cabelos eram o que viria a definir esse estigma futuramente. Lembro de um amigo e artista maravilhoso que me provoca muito, Tiago Rivado, me falando que era maravilhoso ver em Libertar-ser o quanto eu não sabia o que eu estava fazendo. E era exatamente sobre isso… Eu não sabia qual era o meu sentimento, eu só sabia que era algo que vinha de fora pra dentro e que ele tinha embates diversos. Depois do Egito que eu fui entender que existia narrativa entre libertar-ser e I=I.
Esse convite se deu por intermédio da Monica Hirano (hoje minha produtora) que estava produzindo a bienal e pediu pra mandar meu projeto. Ele foi aceito, consegui por meio de um financiamento coletivo afetivo produzido pelo Gilberto Vieira. conseguimos 10k pra essa viagem.
Cheguei no Cairo no dia do segundo turno que elegeu Bolsonaro, aos prantos e me sentindo culpado por não ter votado nesse dia, mas sabendo que estava me propondo a algo importante. Fiquei mais de 2 horas no aeroporto tendo a minha mala investigada, sem saber nem falar inglês direito. Só falava “I’m an artist” com a carta da bienal na mão e meu único medo era o momento deles pegarem o meu remédio que levei nos frascos originais. A performance já começava ali, se eu fosse interrompido, ela também teria acontecido…
No fim eles ficaram tão entretidos com o figurino que só pegaram o remédio, abriram, viram que estava lacrado e me deixaram ir embora.
Consegui uma assistente lá do Cairo pra me auxiliar na produção, todos os frascos e rótulos foram produção local. Os frascos foram até que fáceis de achar, já os rótulos tivemos que andar por pelo menos 4 gráficas que não queriam imprimir por conter as palavras “gay” “HIV” e “AIDS” no conteúdo. Todas palavras proibidas até de mencionar naquele país. A assistente teve que falar que era pra um trabalho de faculdade. O corte dos rótulos vieram cheios de risadas e reprovações dos caras que cortavam e a performance foi um sucesso. Mesmo que ainda sem muito formato por ser a primeira, ela foi censurada, não pude ficar sem camiseta e tinham policiais filmando todos os movimentos da abertura da bienal. Ela estava toda em inglês então acho que as chances de ser mais censurada diminuíram. Nunca antes tinha me visto sendo observado por tanta gente, lembro até de uma criança me oferecendo coisas pra beber e me ajudando a tirar os rótulos, foi forte! Durou 3 horas, quase que a abertura toda e eu sentia que quem entendia tinha uma mistura de dó com compaixão. No fim, alguns homens vieram me abraçar e agradecer por aquele movimento. Suponho que eles eram positivos. Eu não me envolvi com as causas do país, não deu tempo, tentamos um contato com a UNAIDS de lá mas não teve sucesso. Mas pra mim, enquanto proponente, estar ali levando aquelas palavras que não podem nem ser faladas impressas em 740 frascos de remédios, já me fez ter sentido.
Naquele ano de 2018 o Egito tinha dobrado a quantidade de infecções durante toda a história da epidemia lá. Foram 11k novas infecções. Fiquei exatamente 1 mês lá, dei uma circulada, achei uma loucura, nunca antes tinha vivido uma cultura tão diferente da minha. Fiz uma pegação, os gays em grande maioria não moram lá por conta da proibição e são todos bem fechados. O aplicativo Grindr ja vem com uma notificação dizendo para tomar cuidado com “policiais disfarçados”. Fiquei com medo e preferi não me envolver. Imagina se fosse pego sendo gay e ainda por cima posithivo. Risos.
TLL: Você teve uma exposição no Rio, no Centro Cultural Hélio Oiticica. Você poderia falar mais sobre isso? Eu conheço um pouco (muito pouco:) sobre ele … E na minha cabeça ele e a prática dele têm umas similaridades com a sua. É imaginação minha? Outras pessoas também dizem isso? E para você, existe uma relação?
VC: A performance no HO, foi a última atividade deles e minha de 2019. Eles me cederam o espaço e eu consegui que a produção fosse financiada por uma amiga, Silvana Bahia. Por ser uma instituição pública e pelo Rio/Brasil estar passando por momentos de sucateamento e dificuldades de estímulos à cultura, tudo estava bem precário. Estavam quase sem profissionais, nem dinheiro pra faxina eles tinham. Muito triste ver um lugar que sedia e dá abertura, principalmente para artistas periféricos, se encontrar naquele estado. Mas ainda que com dificuldades, a falta de estrutura deu força e gerou um novo caminho pro meu trabalho. Tivemos que imprimir os rótulos em papel adesivo normal, isso impossibilitou a retirada fácil dos rótulos e promoveu uma necessidade coletiva dos expectadores. Quando me vi propondo a todos que eles tirassem as informações contidas nos rótulos, pensei: ‘uau, estou inserindo informações neles e junto comigo estão des-rotulando.’ Tenho dito que essa foi a ação coletiva mais potente que eu me vi proponente. Tanto que agora teremos as 2 formas de rótulos, em papel vinílico, que facilita tirar e o adesivo de papel normal. No MAM-SP, por exemplo, eu retirei todos os rótulos e a interação se dava no meu movimento de colar nos expectadores. Ainda consegui reforçar a conclusão de que “As sequelas, os resquícios e a proliferação do vírus do HIV/AIDS sempre vai se mostrar fixado e mais presente nos territórios onde se tem precariedade, falta de acesso e de políticas públicas efetivas.
Estamos falando de (falta de) estrutura!”
Esse texto foi legenda de uma foto que tirei minutos antes de eu começar a limpar os resquícios da minha performance na segunda-feira depois de ter sido advertido pela instituição por ter deixado e não ter limpado sabendo das condições deles.
Já as similaridades com os trabalhos do Hélio, eu agradeço. Nunca antes tinha parado pra pensar sobre isso, me identifico no seu modo subversivo anarquista e vanguardista. Mas acho que enquanto artista, minimamente politizado, todos aqui levamos um pouco do Helio. Ele é pro Brasil uma das maiores referências que temos. Eu queria mesmo é ter vivido com ele em vários momentos. Risos!
Tenho uma certa dificuldade em colocar minhas referências em questão. Quando falo sobre meu corpo e sobre arte/HIV é uma coisa que está tão ligada e se torna tão genuína que óbvio que não existe corpo sem referência, mas minha construção se baseia na necessidade e na observação de outros corpos como o meu, basicamente.
Esclarecimento sobre ‘juntar pessoas,’ após o surgimento do COVID19:
“Oi Todd. É mais ou menos a mesma coisa sim. Eu só tô ainda pensando em como eu vou agir com esse projeto. A ideia é que a gente consiga articular pessoas e artistas positivos a propor novos olhares, um olhar mais positivo mesmo, sabe. Mas eu acho que isso também, agora pensando, pode ser uma interrupção de formatos, de outros corpos. Então eu acho que a liberdade nessa proposição, ela tem que ser livre mesmo, não da pra gente induzir outros corpos a fazer outras coisas. Ela tem que ser livre. Mas eu acho que pensar nessa nova linguagem de trazer menos dor e trazer informação com um pouco mais de… Não sei explicar pra você. Mas sim, tudo parte do mesmo. Eu tô agora aqui escrevendo parte desse projeto inclusive. Mas é meio isso, é a mesma coisa, mas é pensar em novos formatos sabe, que não seja com dor, que não seja das pessoas ficarem tocadas. Eu acho que a gente precisa focar agora em outros lugares.”
*** EN
TLL: Hi Vinicius. When we first met you told me you have three projects or perhaps work in three overlapping areas. Can you say something about each and maybe how they are all connected?
VC: Yes, today, asides from [I=I] – a work that introduced me to the milieu of performance, I have 2 projects:
The first is that in the next 10 years, I intend to hack the other 47 countries that somehow restrict my entrance/permanence as a positive body, regardless of serological state. This opening to this took place in Egypt.
We still don’t know exactly how my action will be, but for now we know that it will be a visit with interviews and that my stigma (the hair pieces) will be occupying the city. As if it was explicit that although there are entry restrictions, Aids exists everywhere. The second is a 3-month long project, with still no lead, which will promote meetings from invitations displayed on street posters and distributed throughout the city. In the meetings I intend to propose content that addresses positive matters, such as films, newsletters, performances, and whatever else happens, with a focus on Brazilian content, and in the end I propose a roundtable along with a questionnaire that will create data for a performance on the reproduction of bodies.
The work that already exists is the I=I, which is annual and gradual, and each year more than 365 flasks are added, pertaining to my days of treatment ever since I began it.
Besides these two, I have another project that is still under speculation which is a “posithive cure pain laugh”, for which I invited positive artists to propose new perspectives and possibilities of visions not laden with sadness and death. I believe the time is arriving for us to think about the positive fight with less pain and more strength.
TLL: Actually I’d luv to understand better your artistic practice in general (pertaining to HIV and otherwise). Do you happen to have an artist statement or reflections on your ‘artistic journey’ so far? Please feel free to change the questions to suit the way you want to respond. I’m always interested to know how artists differentiate between their work (or practice) and life in general.
VC: Definitively, I have no strategy or departing point. My life was always defined by chance. I was never able to plan too many things, maybe for the lack of money or even due to my personality.
At work, I chose to research non-normative bodies in art, fashion and cinema. I began this research in 2010, when I gave up on several occasions the opportunity to work in the white/rich milieu in order to focus on projects that would really make a difference for me and others.
I don’t think that we should protocol work as being a “bread winner.” Pleasure has to arise in professional articulations. It is a pity to think that, maybe in Brazil, although it exists, this research is still little valued. In theory, maybe, I chose pleasure instead of wealth. I’ve had the opportunity to work with powerful people but gave it all up because I was not seeing myself present in any of those spaces. And when HIV came up, I had two choices, silence or the possibility of dismantling silence itself. I chose to open up, and nothing was more obvious than to put my own body in question. That is where performance came from. I am not an academic body nor do I even defend academia. I think we are living an academic decline that does not allow as a possibility street experience, for example. I defend my research and my interest in the gaze, the experience, and mostly in the transit. Academia puts us in places that are too theoretical, but experience is what makes us have plausible conclusions about any subject. The truth is that one needs one another, and I have chosen the other.
TLL: I remember something you said when we met about aesthetics in relation to HIV. I’m particularly interested in this line of thought. Please expound:
VC: It’s cool that that left a mark on you.
I defend aesthetic as a form of information, but even in this way, it is kept sublime and open to various conclusions. When I think of art/HIV, I think of work that has a depth of information. Although we have lived for a long time with the matter of HIV/AIDS, what brings us to a growing epidemic is the lack of information. It is crazy to see that we still do not have effective public policy in Brazil, and I think that the potentiality will happen through new information tools. That’s where art comes in. Yet, however sublime it may present itself, we are never going to be able to free ourselves from information, it is what will make us, one day, think of introducing a non-conclusion to a positive work of art. Before this happens, I defend that all approaches must be based on, as well as introduce, information. At least this is my work format. While I also defend the “popular discourse” as a more comprehensive and effective means of transformation, I think of my people, of my aunt who lives far away, of those who did not learn to search for information. We are a country with the induction of information and with high audience rates in big tv channels, here people have the latest TV models to watch Globo, for example. Although there is global access, we are far from technological expertise and from having the awareness to search for sources that really bring us concrete information.
TLL: Can you tell me more about your trip to Egypt for the Cairo Biennial? Did you stay long and would you say that your performance piece was seen outside of the frame of the government-sponsored art event? Was your performance billed explicitly as pertaining to HIV? I’m curious about the public’s reaction to your work.
VC: Oh, Egypt!
The Cairo Biennial was a space that chose me to open up by condition as posithive. Before this I spent 2 years formulating my opening up. I rehearsed a performance that is called “Libertar-ser,” under the curation of Susana Guardado for a project that is called Prazer é Poder, in Rio, where I contracted HIV. In this performance my body was only a stigma. The hair pieces were what would come to define this stigma in the future. I remember a friend and wonderful artist who provokes me a lot, Tiago Rivaldo, telling me that it was amazing to see in Libertar-ser how much I had no idea what I was doing. And it was exactly about that… I did not know what I was feeling, I just knew that it was something that came from the outside in and that it underwent several clashes. After Egypt I learned that there was a narrative between Libertar-ser and I=I.
This invitation happened through the Monica Hirano (my producer today) as an intermediary, who was producing the Biennial and asked me to send the project. It was accepted, I was able to do it through a collective affective financing by Gilberto Vieira. We were able to raise 10k for this trip. I arrived in Cairo in the day of the second round of elections that elected Bolsonaro, I was in tears and feeling guilty for not having voted on this day, but I knew that I was proposing myself to something important. I spent more than 2 hours in the airport with my suitcase being investigated, with me not knowing how to speak English well. All I could say was “I’m an artist,” with the Biennial letter in my hand. My only fear was of them grabbing my medicines that I took in their original flasks. The performance was already starting there, if I had been interrupted, it would already have happened…
In the end they were so entertained by my costume that they only took the medicine, opened it, saw that it was sealed, and let me go.
I was able to get an assistant in Cairo to help me with the production, all of the flasks and labels were locally produced. The flasks were even easy to find, but for the labels we had to go through at least 4 print shops that did not want to print them out because they contained the words “gay”, “HIV”, and “Aids.” These are all words that are prohibited from even being mentioned in that country. My assistant had to say that it was a work for college. The guys cut up the labels while laughing a lot and being disapproving of it. The performance was a success. Although it still did not have a lot of format, for being the first, it was censored, I was not allowed to be shirtless, and there were cops filming every movement at the Biennial opening. It was all in English, so I think that the chances of it being censored diminished. I had never before found myself being watched by so many people, I even remember a child that offered my things to drink and helped me remove the labels, it was strong! It lasted 3 hours, almost the entire opening, and I felt that those who understood it felt a mixture of pity and compassion. In the end, some men came to hug and thank me for that move. I suppose that they were positive. I did not get involved with the country’s causes, I did not have time, we tried to get in contact with the UNAIDS there, but without success. But for me, as a proponent, to be there and to be taking those words that can’t even be said out loud, printed onto 740 medicine flasks, already gave it meaning to me.
In that year, of 2018, Egypt had doubled the amount of infections during the entire history of the epidemics there. There were 11k new infections. I was there for one exact month, walked around, thought it was all crazy, I had never experienced a culture that was so different from mine. I had a hook up there, most of the gays don’t live there due to the prohibition and they are all very closed off. The Grindr app already comes with a notice to be careful with “undercover cops.” I was scared and preferred to not get involved. Imagine if I was caught being gay, and even more, being posithive? [Laughs]
Centro Cultural Hélio Oiticica (I=I Rio de Janeiro) Fotos: Daniel Toledo
TLL: You recently had an exhibition in Rio de Janeiro at the Hélio Oiticica Cultural Center. Can you say more about that? Was it the same piece you performed in Cairo? I know a little bit about the work (and style) of Hélio Oiticica, and in my head I can imagine similarities between his work and yours. Is this just my imagination? Have others made this comparison? And, well, do you make a connection yourself?
VC: The performance at HO was their and my last activity in 2019. They conceded me the space and I was able to have the production financed by a friend, Silvana Bahia. For being a public institution, and because Rio/Brazil is going through moments of scrapping and difficulty in the promotion of culture, everything was very precarious. They were almost without professionals, they didn’t even have money for the cleaning. It is very sad to see a place that hosts and gives exposure, especially for artists from the periphery, to find it in that state. Even with difficulties, the lack of structure gave strength and generated a new path for my work. We had to print out the labels on normal adhesive paper, which made it impossible to easily remove the labels, and promoted a collective necessity by the spectators. When I saw myself proposing to everyone that they remove the information contained on the labels, I thought: “wow, I am inserting information onto them, and they are un-labeling together with me.” I have said that that was the most potent collective action that I have found myself being a proponent of. So much so that we will now have the 2 types of labels on vinyl, which facilitates the removal of the normal adhesive paper. At MAM-SP, for example, I removed all of the labels and the interaction took place in my movement of gluing it onto the spectators. I can still stress the conclusion that “The aftermath, the remnants, and the proliferation of the HIV/AIDS virus will always reveal itself as fixed to, and more present in precarious territories, where there is a lack of access and effective public policies.
We are talking about a (lack of) structure!”
This text was the caption of a photo that I took minutes after arriving to clean up the remnants from my performance on Monday, after being adverted by the institution for having left and not cleaned up, knowing their condition.
Now, regarding similarities with Hélio’s work, I thank you. I had never stoped before to think about this, I identify with his subversive anarchist and vanguardist ways. But I think that like any minimally politicized artist, we all take a little bit from Hélio. He is, for Brazil, one of the biggest references we have. What I really wanted was to have lived with him on many occasions. [Laughs]
I have a certain difficulty putting my references in question. When I talk about my body and art/HIV, it is something that is so interlinked, and it becomes so genuine, that obviously there is no body that has no reference, but, basically, my construction is based on the necessity and observation of other bodies like my own.
Post-COVID19 outbreak clarification on ‘getting people together’:
“Hi Todd. Yes, it is sort of the same thing. I am still thinking about how I’m gonna act in this new project. The idea is that we articulate positive people and artists, for them to propose new outlooks, a more positive one. You know, now that I was thinking, this can also be an interruption of formats, of other bodies’. So I think that liberty in this position really needs to be free, we can’t induct other bodies into doing things. It has to be free. But I think that we need to think about this new language that brings less pain and brings more information with a little bit of… I don’t know how to explain it to you. But yes, it is all part of the same thing. I am even now over here writing up this project. But that’s kind of it, it is the same thing, but it is to ask for new formats, one that isn’t all about pain, or all about moving people. I think that we need to focus on new areas.”
Museu de Arte Moderna (I=I São Paulo) Fotos: Carol Araujo
[*Five or so years ago Canadian artist Niki Singleton and I made a Facebook project called Coming Out of the Web 2.0 Closet. We both had a story whereby ‘friends’ or family members had used social media to shun us or tell us we were going to hell or something similar for being gay, and out. A couple more friends from NYC and Beirut gave us their stories to render in five-frame comic strips. I hear HIV being referred to in a variety of coded ways (like having a House In Virginia), and for sure we talk about it as a second closet to come out of … so I decided to reboot this project here in the LUV scrapbook (of things). I’m also really fond of another work we made called Host-an-Occupier along with Danish collective Wooloo and Mexican-American artist Alicia Marvan. xo Todd]
[*A longer EN language interview is available below for download; Todd Lanier Lester interviews Adriana Bertini for LUV.]
TLL: We met first in Barcelona at the 14th International AIDS Conference in 2002. I don’t remember too much about the trip, except that I was presenting a poster with a colleague on community sensitization work on HIV/AIDS we’d done together in the East Province of Cameroon as US Peace Corps volunteers. Again, a very long time ago.
I recently wrote about my first HIV work on the LUV site, and I guess it had to do with being ‘plopped’ down in a location for which it was an urgency. I reacted to my surroundings, not so different than how I have reacted to urban issues here in São Paulo. For me it is about responding to what is around me, and relates to my personal notion of what you do when you live in a place. The only difference I can think of is that I now call myself an artist. I began this HIV-related work 20 years ago, and before I myself contracted HIV.
Since you’ve been doing this work for just as long, I wanted to first say thank you for your dedication, and ask you to explain how you started and what moved you to action in what you term ‘artHIVism’ (I noticed in your e-mail signature:)
AB: O Trabalho com arte aliado à Aids nasce de uma intervenção artística em Porto Alegre em 1994, um convite do ator Fabiano Menna para uma performance, fui literalmente fisgada pela causa. Em 1995 entro para a ONG GAPA em Florianópolis como voluntária. Ali eu cuidava de crianças vivendo com HIV, a maioria de transmissão vertical. E um dia por acaso eu ganho do secretário da saúde uma caixa com 144 preservativos vencidos e ali começa o meu processo de investigação artística sobre a matéria prima e como fazer arte com este objeto para chamar a atenção para a prevenção, falar de sexualidade e os perigos do prazer sem advogar a abstinência.
Com o passar dos anos, estudando e fazendo experimentos artísticos, o trabalho de arte passa por uma evolução natural, onde eu busco através da manifestação artística integrar ativismo a arte, saúde e educação.
Inquieta com a questão da adesão à TARV, principalmente com jovens dou início à pesquisa de outros materiais para promover a adesão, como medicamentos, embalagem e objetos que remetem à saúde sexual, e há dois anos criei esta palavra artHivismo como um novo conceito, não sou ativista sou uma artHivista porque relaciono minha arte diretamente com o HIV.
TLL: I’ve read your Creative Workshop manual (see download below), and a bit of the background of condom art. Do you make other works outside the theme of HIV? Do you see yourself more as a public health activist, an artist or both?
AB: Eu trabalho paralelamente com outras questões sociais na arte. Trabalhei por alguns anos na Anistia Internacional em Bruxelas como Strong Voice e Artivista para o Fim da Mutilação Genital Feminina e em outras causas sociais como câncer de mama, tráfico de órgãos, etc… Meu projeto futuro é trabalhar a Fome e escolhi para a representação artística o Pão como alimento-referência em todas as culturas globais. Eu me vejo como uma artista social.
TLL: Adriana, you recently visited Los Angeles and UCLA I believe. You were there doing HIV-related art education, or this is what I remember from our brief discussion. Let’s use your trip to LA as a way to discuss your work. What did you do while you were there? Are there specific organizations you’d like for us to know about? Would you say that this trip is typical for you?
AB: Eu fui convidada como Artist in Residence por três setores da UCLA:
Trabalhamos em parceria desde 2006. E este convite foi para várias ações artísticas que envolveu:
Public Speaker, Workshop Público no dia comunitário do Fowler Museum e um workshop intensivo chamado de Fiat Lux Class (Creative Workshop).
No Condom Art Workshop (Creative Workshop) intensivo trabalhamos a teoria do artivismo, a construção do diálogo crítico e debates sobre saúde sexual, métodos contraceptivos e como banir o estigma.
Foram diversas dinâmicas usando poesia, desenho, fotografia, vídeo, performance para a construção do trabalho final, uma apresentação.
O conceito do workshop foi como banir estigma e pudemos criar coletivamente um novo diálogo sempre trabalhando técnicas de arte com camisinha, recorte, colagem, pigmentação, costura, modelagem.
É uma oficina muito rica porque além dos temas propostos e das técnicas artísticas aprendidas, levamos para as questões mais pessoais que são as experiências vividas na sua sexualidade, e colocar isso à tona dentro da classe fortalece os jovens e os empodera para suas escolhas mais conscientes.
TLL: And, lastly, what’s next? Importantly, I’d luv to know your vision for HIV-related work in São Paulo where we both live.
AB: Eu acredito muito na educação sexual de forma transversal nas escolas e na universidade, e volto de Los Angeles fortalecida a procurar mais espaços de diálogo em São Paulo, por mais difícil que seja e percebo que tanto os jovens americanos, brasileiros, europeus e asiáticos têm a mesma demanda, precisam de informação de forma criativa, contemporânea, rápida e atual como resposta à epidemia, o diálogo lúdico, moderno e a arte tem este poder de tocar mentes e corações para uma possível transformação.
LUV: Thanks so much for taking time to share your work!
[*Working together with the City of São Paulo office of Human Rights, George Ferraz prepared (styled) two downtown cultural spaces for Love Positive Women 2020 with the theme of Yemanjá and using the posters designed by Thiago. A message from the Office of Human Rights was distributed along with Valentines Day cards. The Human Rights flier encourages HIV+ women to use the city’s three citizenship centers for meetings any time of the year, and provides a QR Code to find more info easily. Both Tapera Taperá bar and esponja spaces in São Paulo hosted Love Positive Women-related info / set-ups. Thiago made the candles for an event in NYC held on February 9th. George helped with the event too, making some more cloth hearts, like the ones distributed in São Paulo and Khartoum. There were extra hearts and we mailed them to Puerto Rico with Valentines cards. Some also went to the cast of I, OF COURSE, WAS LIVID, a Love Positive Women-affiliated event at Housing Works bookstore. And, about 15 leftover candles go on to the VisualAIDS Women’s Empowerment Art Therapy Workshops. Thanks guys! xo, Todd]
