Lima as a departure point, the only stimulus, direct contact with the city. Without preconceived ideas or previous studies we generated audio-visual projects and installations through real life street experiences, dialogue with it’s people and the appropriation and decontextualization of local resources. The exhibition consists of two well defined parts.
First a photographic documentation of everything that caught our attention during the four weeks that we were in Peru. A visual stimuli that served as raw material to produce the pieces. Second, a synthesis of this experience materialized in the form of sculptural installations and a mural in the exhibition space of the prestigious Spanish Cultural Center in Lima.
During our stay we tried to document everything as well as possible. Everything that caught our attention during our excursions throughout the city. This experience served as a base for all the projects that were formed during the exhibition.
The intense and chaotic traffic of Lima, the size of the city and the lack of a solid framework of “official” public transport accentuates one’s movement from one point to another.
Along side the taxis and motorcycle-taxis (although rarely visible in the center, they can be seen in other districts) one finds the “combis” without a doubt the most popular means of transport.
Managed by private companies, each with their “war paint”, these small buses are the owners of the road.
In a motorized society, the car is a reflection of the conductor´s personality.
This is, in our modest opinion, the greatest graphic advocate for the culture of cumbia and chicha music. In contrast to the gray spring weather, the colors of these posters were like a light at the end of a tunnel: Totally hypnotic.
By all means possible we had to try our own version and thanks to Jules Bay, curator of the exhibition, we were brought 13 kilometers outside of the city to meet the Urcuhuaranga brothers. There they explained to us how their father had invented this technic.
The posters are designed by hand, in their actual size, on plain white butcher paper. This design is what will be used once cut, as a template for our silkscreen prints.
There is no use of chemicals and no photographic processes. It is this paper that clogs the mesh of the screen, and once finished, nothing remains of the original design, making it impossible to repeat this poster in the same way.
The information provided on the poster is structured in the same way, facilitating the reading for the viewer: Day, place and musical group.
Following this formula we developed five posters, from a very satirical standpoint, about four topics that attracted our attention in Lima: The food, the weather, the submerged economy and filthy traffic as well as an individual poster that was purely self-promotional.
Another appropriation from the “chicha” culture. An amazing technique although clearly used less often than before because of the proliferation of the gigantic photographic plotter.
It is totally ephemeral and lasts no more than a month. Used to advertise music events, like the chicha signs, but in large-scale strategic sites, the banner is made from a very thin nylon fabric wallpaper with hand cut letters and glued with a paste made of water and flour. Simple but effective.
Our banner was hung near a popular market on a central highway, one of Lima’s major gateways, camouflaged among other “real” banners.
Within the space of the cultural center we decided to put a replica, but on a smaller scale. For many people visiting the exhibition, this was the first time they had seen one so closely and were especially surprised by the materials used to manufacture the poster.
We did five other pieces inspired by objects seen in our daily routine in Lima.
Artist—Nuria Mora
