Unlock

“Unlock” is a work aimed mainly at viewers born in the late 90s/early 2000s, in which the user unlocks images (memories) by clicking on the paintings. Just as the images are hidden, so is the reason for each color in the paintings. These correspond to the colors of the painting “The Lovers” by René Magritte, taking into account the location of each rectangle.

Technical, aesthetic and conceptual development

The first inspiration for this work comes from Cesar Aira’s text “On Contemporary Art”. In it, he mentions the Belgian painter René Magritte, who painted “The Lovers”, a work that I personally like a lot. You can see the colors of this painting reflected in the paintings hanging on the wall, projected as something hidden. This idea arises from what Aira mentions: “The Contemporary Artist continues to move forward, remains one step ahead, and puts his ingenuity and inventiveness into ensuring that his work contains an aspect, a side, a point, that remains hidden even from the most innovative and exhaustive reproduction technique.” I notice and expose this hidden “side or tip” as the author of the work, without the expectation or intention that the viewer will also notice it.

Taking into account also this quote from the text “New Media” by Christiane Fricke: ”[…] Heinrich Klotz is convinced that traditional art forms will never become anachronistic. In his opinion, we have “simply a broader spectrum of mediating instruments, where the conventional arts retain their place. The history of art over the last 180 years shows that the spectrum of media has expanded without any of them falling into disuse.” “Just because you have a synthesizer you are not going to get rid of a grand piano."" The involvement of “The Lovers” is a way to share this idea. A surrealist painting from 1928 that inspires a contemporary work, both captured in the same work in their own way. The new media are based on the old ones, they can even coexist in the same work.

What is sought in this work is that the viewer (especially those towards whom it is directed) can unlock memories when they manage to see each of the images. Let him feel something, sadness, happiness, etc. This is extremely linked to nostalgia, which despite being a difficult topic to deal with, is a feeling that concerns us and attracts us. “If it is art, or for it to be art, it must create new values; […] “Creating values” is intervening in the personal history of the viewer” explains Aira. This intervention is achieved if the viewer feels some type of relationship with the work, which is why it is aimed at a certain audience.

Literature

AIRA, César. (2013). Sobre el arte contemporáneo. FRICKE, Christiane. (1999). Nuevos Medios.