INTERPRETING THE PLACE: ISRAEL ARIÑO
INTERPRETING THE PLACE: ISRAEL ARIÑO
CREDITS
Israel Ariño (b. 1974, Catalonia) tests the limits of what is representable. His two books ‘La gravetat del lloc’ (2017) and ‘Voyage en pays du clermontois’ (2019) might be visually distinct from one another but both focus on a similar interest: subjective perceptions of reality. Both book projects support the revealing of unknown places hidden in the realm of one’s imagination.
‘La gravetat del lloc’ (‘The gravity of the place’) is inspired by ‘Paraules Locals’ (‘Local Words’), an essay written by Catalan artist and poet Perejaume (b. 1957) concerned with the importance of certain locations and the objects that construct these places. For example, an unnoticed brick or a forgotten wooden pallet. All the pictures in ‘La gravetat del lloc’ are made with a large format analog camera, the richness of its depth of field making each frame look even more detailed. The book is printed on ultra-thin paper.
For ‘Voyage en pays du clermontois’ (‘Trip to the Clermont country’, 2019), Ariño opted for a collaboration with the artist Clara Gassul (b. 1994, Catalonia). She made a colour interpretation of the originally black-and-white images made by Ariño. It is important to note here that Gassul has actually never visited the portrayed region or even seen images of it before, so this invitation was an interesting challenge that gave birth to a free flow of interpretations for the viewer.
