I am the other | Romeo Gongora

Romeo Gongora’s project accompanies the exhibition Don’t Stare At the Sun. Works from Daros Latinamerica Collection. The artist will give a talk summarizing his project in Studio&Kitchen on 25th June, 6 pm. An introduction discussing Lygia Clark’s work will be provided by Kamila Wielebska.

With his project I am the Other Romeo Gongora refers to Lygia Clark’s series of actions entitled Estruturação do Self. The Brazilian artist developed her own therapeutic method called structuring the self, or therapy of touch. Clark used “relational objects” made of ordinary materials, such as plastic bags filled with water, stockings with feathers or stones, shells or pieces of rubber pipes. The therapeutic sessions run by Clark in the 1970s enabled participants to “reestablish contact with their corporality, rediscover the feeling of organic union with the world and others, leading to disappearance of the cause of trauma, that is separation of the subject from the object world” (quoted after K. Tomczak Wysocka, „Dotykoterapia" Lygii Clark, www.obieg.pl/artmix/9065).

Drawing inspiration from Clark’s notes, Romeo Gongora devised his own project in which he not only deals with the legacy of the cult artist but also reflects upon the phenomena of ready-mades, alienation and opposition between viewers/observers and participants in the artistic action. As a form of revisiting and reinterpreting Lygia Clark’s project, Romeo Gongora conducted a series of sessions to which he invited people living in Torun. For that purpose, the artist assembled a variety of found objects. Gongora compares the process of working on the project to mutual repulsion and attraction between opposites, both in relations with the participants, as well as in the context of his own artistic attitude, struggling with Lygia Clark’s charismatic figure.

Romeo Gongora - (Canada/Guatemala) – graudated from UQAM (2005), exhibited at Musée d'art contemporain w Montrealu, Galerie de l’UQAM (Montreal), Centre d'art contemporain OPTICA (Montreal), Centre de diffusion et de production de la photographie VU (Quebec), Gallery 44 (Toronto) and Centre de photographies actuelles DAZIBAO in Montreal, amongst others. Collaborated with Centro de la Imagen (Mexico City) and Centre Culturel de Neumünster (Luxemburg). Since 2007 he has been the resident artist at the Rijksakademie van Beeldende Kunsten (Amsterdam). In 2009 he represents Canada as an artist in residence at the Künstlerhaus Bethanien (Berlin).