From the 11th of April to the 13th of June 2003.
Itziar Ocariz (San Sebastian, 1965) has turned her
work into an apparatus that delves not only into personal, but also social
tensions and places special emphasis on the relationship individual/society
from a feminist perspective. Back in the '70's, under the motto "personal
is political", the feminist movement began a new phase that, by overcoming
the notion of the individual, searched for a concept that would assume
the constituting factor of all human and social existence. This was when
the consideration of an alternative concept of the subject acquired particular
relevance: subject as a standpoint. This standpoint conceives the subject
as emerging from historical experience and, in this respect, its internal
characteristics are not as relevant as the external context in which they
are situated. The subject's positional revaluation relativates its identity
to a constantly changing context, a situation that includes a network
of elements (others, economic conditions, cultural and political institutions,
etc.). In this way, individual/society relationships were considered from
a sexual perspective and new keys for understanding the contemporary subject
became widely popular whilst, at the same time, specific paths of action
were being put forward in order to achieve social equality between sexes.
The work of Itziar Ocariz is comprehensible when considered as falling
within this intellectual, social and artistic feminist tradition.
On the other hand, for some time now, the artist has combined
these standpoints with international situational investigations related
to culture and artistic production by applying her own concepts of "action
and drift" as the methodology for her own work. In his basic document
that forms the very foundation of situationalism, Guy Debord states that:
"...we believe that the world must be changed. We want a change that
will free society and the life we are living as much as possible. We know
that this change is possible if we take the proper paths of action".
Thus situationists were concerned about certain paths of action and the
discovery of others - easily identifiable in the domains of culture and
customs - as applied from the standpoint of an interaction of all revolutionary
change. From this point of view, what we call culture not only manifests
but also pre-establishes the possibilities of organising life in any chosen
society.
For situationists, the only valid experimental path open
is based on the criticism of existing conditions and in their being deliberately
overcome. Creation is not the conciliation of objects and shapes, but
the invention of new laws governing these relationships.
Among several different situationist procedures, drift
is presented as being an interim technique for passing uninterruptedly
through several different environments. The drift concept is indissolubly
bound to the acknowledgement of effects having a psycho-geographic nature
and the affirmation of a play-constructive behaviour, something that directly
and completely opposes the classic notions of journey and trips in every
possible way. The laws of drift permit us to establish the first pictures
of psycho-geographic articulations of modern cities. Going far beyond
the mere recognition of environmental units, main components and spatial
localisation, their main transition axis, exits and defences are perceived
with the difference being the fact that it is not a question of precisely
defining long-lasting blocks, but rather transforming architecture and
urban planning.
To use the artist's own words, Itziar Ocariz proposes a
series of actions that "consist in "transgressing" mandatory
norms of behaviour and transit". In her understanding of drift being
creative tradition, the artist carries out actions in urban surroundings,
with special emphasis on the active characteristic of drift being a form
of experimental behaviour.
After the artist's exhibition entitled "Peeing in
Public and Private Places" that we in Bilbao could see recently in
the Museo de Bellas Artes (Fine Arts Museum) in the "Gaur, Hemen,
Orain" joint exhibition, BilboArte presents "Trepar Edificios"
("Climbing Buildings"). Action occurred at the heart of Bilbao's
Plaza Circular on the 26th of January 2003. A woman climbed the façade
of the RENFE building in the Abando train station in broad daylight, to
the surprise of passers by. This proposal concerning the occupation and
transit of members of the general public as ideological, and therefore
political positioning, opens up new perspectives for the feminine subject
as an entity that interacts with architecture and those male and female
citizens using the space and who, in turn, inhabit the city. With "Climbing
Buildings", new habitat and public space possibilities are opened
up for the feminine subject, whilst revealing the nature of the interests
that traditionally regulate them. Several cameras filmed the event simultaneously.
Using these recordings/remnants of the action, the "Climbing
Buildings" exhibition reconstructs the action, endowing the action
with new senses and adapting it to the context of an exhibition hall.
Xabier Arakistain, exhibition
curator.