Coral exhibition

Ibicenco

José del Río Mons / Baron Wolman / Miguel Soler-Roig / Juan Barte / Subodh Kerkar /

Cristina Iturrioz / Renate Widmann / Can / EllebannA (Annabel Widmann) /

Djin Omen / Carlos Torreblanca / Antón Goiri / Juan Mas-Bagá / Friedrich Saller /

Jessica Sturgess / Marco Ferraris / Burkhard Von Harder / Romy Querol Soler /

Hipgnosis

Curated by Diego Alonso

Centro Cultural de Jesús - 6th to 30th October 2016

Calle Faisán 7 – JESUS - IBIZA

Hours: Monday to Friday 16 to 21 hs

OPENING - Thursday 6th October / 20:30hs

PRESENTATION of film "THE LAST HARE" by José del Río Mons 21:15hs

PERFORMANCE by ellebannA 21:30hs

Tribute to TONI PLANELLS

 

MONDO GALERIA presents at the Cultural Center in Jesús (IBIZA) an unprecedented exhibition curated by Diego Alonso it is dedicated to the island of Ibiza and the creative peculiarity of this Balearic island. Since ancient times it has attracted creative elites from different corners of the planet and has ment a major change in the perception of their lives and work.

This eclectic exhibition, scattered in the wind of time, counts in its opening with the screening of the short film "The Last Hare" by José del Río Mons with original music by Richard Sturgess and artist Barry Flanagan as protagonist.

 

THE FILM

“The last hare” José del Río Mons presents his short film (15 m.) dedicated to the welsh artist Barry Flanagan (ill with a sickness which finished his life) modeling his last sculpture.
*Original music by Richard Sturgess

 

THE PERFORMANCE

QUANTUM GALACTIC A wardrobe performance that transports us into a hypnotic state of fantasy through creating an optical illusion of transcendence of organisms and molecules. ellebannA (Annabel Widmann) takes the audience to experience a fantasy world through it.

TRIBUTE

“Nowadays, Ibiçenco folklore is valued; but, when I started out, many people criticised us and thought we would make fools of ourselves out there in the world. We were more appreciated off the island than on it. So, I am gratified that those who disparaged us then are now directors of dance groups and are having to teach it to their children. Everything has changed completely; and those who visit from abroad have almost more interest in our dance than we have. Many students at the colles are sons and daughters of mainlanders and there is even a foreigner or two”.

Toni Planells, Periódico de Ibiza, April 2010

THE EXHIBITION

"Sol de Invierno" José del Río Mons

Alone and naked, in between branches of the oak,
shaking, I have finally find you,
december sun.

Come home with me.

Vicente Valero (Días del Bosque, 2008. Visor)

The word "Ibicenco" apart from natural or native of the island, means a particular way of doing, thinking, of relating to the world. As a tribute to this "mode" we gather in this exhibition a group of international artists through their art flirting with the idea of being "Ibicenco" or representing the energy of the island, of the landscapes, the waters, the people and their way of working.

Focused on photography, but not being exclusive, the exhibition traces different visions of Ibiza. In this way, we open a dialogue with the local community on how it looks, how it is or what understands from it different sensitive artists of disparate origins, today, yesterday and tomorrow. How they relate to the place and their customs, their spaces and their culture (current and ancestral). And how that special way of being, living and understanding has become worldwide in being "Ibicenco".

Raoul Hausmann, Broner, Pink Floyd or Naomi Campbell or even Woodstock. The White Island has been an essential part of all processes of creation and counterculture that have flourished in the world through the decades. This exhibition is a tribute to this peculiarity of the island which makes it very important for the creative energy of our planet.

 

"Endless Summer" Miguel Soler-Roig

Summer after summer, I documented unforgettable instants in Ibiza. Now, I look back at them with the perspective of distance, of memories. Images keep on whispering me: wish you were here, so I wish you were here now, but also, I wish you had been there, in those unrepeatable moments, those unique places… ‘till the end of light.

Fresh bright mornings. In spirit, years have passed, miles travelled and experiences gathered from when I first began, what I used to think of a great adventure. In many ways, it still is. Sailing around the island, stories of past and present collide.

Hopes and dreams of people connected to me through moments lived in the past. I feel it. It’s exciting to watch this wonderful seascape and always will be. Paths that lead to a nostalgic travel, without return.

Rocks in the cliff coexist side by side and on top of one another. They are fossils but still stand. A break in the clouds lights up a portion of the water, turning it turquoise blue. Suddenly veer left, away from the shore a beautiful last sight, a mermaid passing by”.

Miguel Soler-Roig “Wish you were here...until the end of light”, 2011

"Woodstok" Baron Wolman

Ibiza, Woodstock, Goa, la década del 60´marca un hito importante en la historia mundial. Hoy podemos ver su legado en fiestas como el Flower Power de Pachá y en la forma de encarar la "slow life" en la Isla Blanca.

“Janis lived a few doors down, the Dead were just around the corner, and the kid living upstairs from photographer Baron Wolman took too much acid and walked in delirium out of the third-floor window, splatting fatally onto the hard, filthy pavement of Haight Street below. The year was ’67, and everyone was grooving.”
Jann Wenner (founder of Rolling Stone magazine)

The biggest festival and Hippie´s gathering of history. 1969 was and important year when every thing started to flee around the world. As spores of freedom colonizing the world in the middle of the Vietnam War they spread around looking for alternative settlements and new world ideas to stop violence. The Hippie Trail started very soon after under the flag of love and allucinogenic reality. Ibiza was one of the first stops. The rest it´s well known History.

"The Division Bell. Pink Floyd" Hipgnosis

In 1967 Aubrey ‘Po’ Powell and Storm Thorgerson were approached by their friends in Pink Floyd to design the cover for the group’s second album, A Saucerful of Secrets. This led to a flurry work from other bands including Free, The Pretty Things, T-Rex and Aynsley Dunbar.
The name Hipgnosis was born out of a chance encounter with a door frame. Aubrey Powell and Storm Thorgerson, founders of the company, had been looking for a name for their fledgling studio. At the time they shared a flat in London’s South Kensington with Pink Floyd’s Syd Barrett and by chance Syd had scrawled in ball-point pen the word HIPGNOSIS on the door. When asked about it, Syd sheepishly denied he had written anything, but Syd was a clever wordsmith and only he could have made up such a brilliant acronym. He is to thank for linking ‘hip’ (pertaining to a cool subculture) with ‘gnostic’ (esoteric knowledge of spiritual matters ) and the noun ‘hypnosis’ (an artificially induced trance state resembling sleep characterised by heightened susceptibility to suggestion).
Over the next fifteen years Hipgnosis gained international prominence. Their famed 1973 cover design for Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side of the Moon paved the way for other major rock bands to set foot in the surreal photo-design world of Po and Storm, resulting in many artworks for Led Zeppelin, Paul McCartney, Genesis, Black Sabbath, Peter Gabriel, The Alan Parsons Project, 10cc, Styx, Bad Company and Yes.
Peter Christopherson (of Throbbing Gristle and Coil fame) joined as an assistant in 1974, and such was his contribution that he became a full partner in 1978. Hipgnosis employed many assistants and artists to work with them over the years including George Hardie, Neville Brody, Richard Evans, Bush Hollyhead, Geoff Halpin and Humphrey Ocean.
By the early 1980s the popularity of expensive and complicated album jackets was on the wain – Punk had arrived and a transition was in progress. Hipgnosis started creating and photographing work for the advertising world but, with increasing frustration and difficulty after a decade and a half of designing art pictures for themselves, they decided to move on. In 1982 Hipgnosis ceased all album cover and advertising work and concentrated instead on moving pictures. Po, Storm and Peter formed the successful film company Green Back Films.

Storm died in 2013. Both of them were often in Ibiza. Powell still spends most of his time in his house of Formentera.

"Ibiza" Juan Barte

It is not necessary to have been born on the island orto be a descendant of generations of payeses to see and feel like Ibicenco.

Being Ibicenco is to simplify life to live in the moment and enjoy Here and Now, take the time to think and to connect, know that true luxury is in the experience and not on the objects, to be able to stop to do things in a correct manner rather than in a fast manner.

Look, feel, live Ibicenco.

 

"Sal de Ibiza" Romy Querol Soler

Tribute to Ibiza, a magic island. The strategic situation of this island in the Mediterranean sea has made it the Goal for several civilazations and empires.

A visual investigation about Ibiza´s salt, the natural element which since the origin gives a particular caracter to the island. Since fenicians on VII b.c. with their first assastment at Sa Caleta, until today, when it´s color reflects on the avantgarde architecture as Jean Nouvelle´s.

"S/T" Carlos Torreblanca

The way that Torreblanca investigates the body has given to his short, but prolific career, a formal integrity that can be found in each of his photographs.

With his search for the Hellenic body, its sensuality, he drives us towards the feeling of an afternoon at the pitiusas beaches where the bodies as reptiles invade the sand or the dark rocks looking for the embrace of sun and water.

"Pietá" Marco Ferraris

This image it´s part of his bigger project “La Isla” (The Island) started in 2010 and that will be in progress probably until 2017.
It expands from Photography to Video art showing a way of relating to a Nature that has been lost in our civilization. By showing bodies in their nudity humans are undressed of the veils of modern society connecting with the original state of being, bringing freedom through the acceptance of the body in all its real splendor and escaping the fears that prevails in our society.

The island is a symbolic microcosm that contains the whole world in it.

"S/T" Fritz Saller

Saller is an specialist synthesizing reality with a single image. He faces, shows, different cultures that coexist in one same space. His connotations appear in every detail, every corner, every shadow.

"Tribute to Raoul Hausmann" Burkhard Von Harder

Sometimes I like to imagine how life must have felt in my North-German village in the days when you could run into Kurt Schwitters at the grocer’s reciting dadaistic sound poems while staying in line. Schwitters would be visiting Raoul Hausmann in his remote enclave from Berlin where he spent the summers with his wife Hedwig Manckiewitz and Vera Broido, his Russian lover and muse (Vera Broido: Daughter of the Revolution - a Russian girlhood remembered, 1998), exploring wider concepts of ‘family’. Hausmann, agravated by the growing number of ignorant city dwellers, was ready to leave their paradise when the Nazis declared his work degenerate. Told by friends about a cheap and authentic place in the Mediterranean - called Ibiza - Hausmann together with both his Jewish companions left Sylt in March 1933, exchanging island for island.

The first volume of HYLE, Raoul Hausmann’s literary DADA chef-d’oeuvre, is built around his time in Kampen on Sylt, unpublished to this day. HYLE II, an abstract portrait of Ibiza and post-reflection of Raoul Hausmann’s exile on the Balearic Island from 1933-36, was published in 1969 (Heinrich Heine Verlag). Its subtitle - Ein Traumsein in Spanien (Etat de Reve en Espagne) - seems to touch at the root, heart and soul of IBICENCO.

While Hausmann managed to get away, painter Anita Ree, stranded in Kampen after her art being declared degenerate as well and, being Jewish, ousted from the Hamburg Sezession, escaped into death at the end of the year.

"Instalación GOA" Subodh Kerkar

Goa, India, has been the second mandatory stop after Ibiza within the Hippie Trail, and later, at the dawn of electronic music. The presence of this work in the exhibition opens the international connection for being “Ibicenco” transcending time and space.

Kerkar’s work, focused on nature and its movements, it is based on his creation of performances or land-art installations which he then record on photographs and videos. In this case, playing with tidal movement creates a círcle of shells on the beach at sunrise, as a moon-reflecting mandala, to be in the afternoon swept by the waves.

"Huevo" Cristina Iturrioz

Art is in Cristina Iturrioz’s genes. Her family tree contains various collectors and artists, and she herself has drawn and painted since girlhood. Although she later opted to study Business and Tax Law at Deusto University, never for a moment did she forsake her artistic creativity; as a student she continued to draw and paint and even dabbled in fashion design. It was a necessity; she was born to create forms, manipulate them and infuse them with rhythm and colour. Her experiences in the art circuit of museums and exhibitions inspired her to continue creating more than just designs, and her enduring friendship with artists helped her, as she freely admits, to always find pleasure in the field where she wanted to be: art. Cristina Iturrioz acknowledges that her contact with artists—good artists—taught her to observe, to contemplate a work of art unhurriedly and to train her vision, something vital and decisive when dealing with any artistic genre.

"Ella" Juan Mas-Bagá

If we talk about Ibiza or Ibicenco we speak of freedom, ease, even in the most traditional aspects. This is what has allowed the island to Be what it Is, time after time. Beyond, economic, political, regional or even sexual disputes, Ibiza and its people have received, encountered and lived with cultures from all around the world until today. Knowing how to maintain a unique and personal integrity centered on coexistence and respect as a way forward into the future nourishing from what it´s different.

"Palo Ibicenco" Jessica Sturgess

Her life is dedicated to love and tribute. For this exhibition she prepares an installation dedicated to Barry Flanagan (her husband) and his passion for ibiçenc "palos". Using some models done by Vicent Juan Albanell combined with her ceramic work she creates a space for memory and reflection at the same time that makes us remember of tradition.

"Flowers and Ink" Renate Widmann

Living in Ibiza the artist focus her art on the observation of nature and on the search for shapes given by it, creating a personal language in which matter from the island takes up its own life.

"Wave" Antón Goiri

Water has a very strong presence in the work of this Basque photographer. In this case he pays a tribute to the wave of the sea, reaching a level of poetry comparable to that achieved by Japanese painters like Hakusai. The great wave that travels the world uniting moving, changing it all.

CONTEXT (in spanish)

Porque el recipiente no es sólo lo lleno, no, lo primero es el vacío; inútil deseo de los ojos que sólo nos deja ver cortes y fragmentos...
Raoul Hausmann “Hyle”, 1926-1936

Desde tiempos remotos y culturas inmemorables, Ibiza, ha sido un punto mágico de encuentro. La tranquilidad Ibicenca y la naturaleza de su entorno han hecho, hacen y harán siempre de este rincón de la tierra un espacio propicio para la creación.


Fenicios y cartagineses adoraban a su paso por Ibosim a la diosa Tanit (Astarté) en cuevas que, por sus dimensiones, permitían el ingreso de embarcaciones hacia el interior de una suerte de catedrales góticas talladas por la erosión del mar y el goteo de sus estalactitas. Tras sus ofrendas y plegarias los marinos se deleitaban con las bondades de la isla y posiblemente se generasen en estas tierras intercambios, trueques, debates y hasta disputas que generaban nuevas ideas en el mundo antiguo. Mucho tiempo ha pasado desde que Cleopatra enviase a sus súbditos a por tierra roja de la isla para sus baños sagrados o bien del momento en que Nostradamus predijo que "Ibiza será el último refugio de la tierra" en el siglo XV. En el XIX el sacerdote Don Francisco Palau se instaló en Es Vedrá donde tuvo todo tipo de encuentros místicos, interestelares y como bien refleja en sus escritos se enfrentó a todo tipo de luminosidad y apariciones de formas con vida inteligente y etérea lo cual nos recuerda de inmediato que este peñasco tan adorado dícese ser el punto de encuentro de Ulises con las Sirenas en la Iíada de Homero.

El pasado, el futuro, bellas invenciones de nuestra inteligencia.

Raoul Hausmann, alma matter del Cabaret Voltaire e idéologo de DaDá, llega a Ibiza explulsado por la intelligentsia Nazi en los años 30, junto a un puñado de artistas y pensadores alemanes entre los que se encontró Walter Benjamin, que se instalaron en la zona de Benimussa, entre San José y San Antonio. La fascinación de estos creadores por la vida rural ibicenca, la bondad de sus tierras y la apacible calma propensa para la creación generó en adelante una ola creativa que convirtió a la isla de los tira piedras en en un laboratorio creativo que permanece abierto hasta nuestros días.

Teorías conspiratorias, extraterrestre, draconianos y seres llegados de la constelación de Lyra, añaden a este punto neurálgico un misticismo que inspira o no deja indiferente a los creadores que la visitan.
Supersticiones, esoterismos, apariciones interestelares o poesía cuántica hacen de esta tierra un generador activo de ideas que confluyen, se retro-alimentan y se esparcen como esporas por todo el mundo. Una turbina de creatividad y conexión, en la que hay sitio también para lo más simple y racional: la arquitectura. Erwin Broner, también entre los fugitivos del nazismo en 1934, creador del grupo Ibiza59, es un pilar importante en el desarrollo mundial de la arquitectura racionalista con fuerte inspiración en la casa tradicional payesa, las iglesias pitiusas y otras construcciones típicas del Mediterráneo, como bien puede apreciarse en su casa situada en el barrio de pescadores de Sa Penya. Broner moriría en 1971, posiblemente sin conocimiento de que ese año se celebraría en Ibiza el VII Congreso Internacional del International Council of Societies of Industrial Design (ISCID), una de las experiencias habitacionales de la época a la que se llamó Instant City, ya que con la tecnología de la época se había creado una ciudad hinchada con aire.

"El grito de la cigarra se interrumpe tan bruscamente como ha empezado" (Raoul Hausmann,
“Hyle” 1926-1936)

Se dice que expandiendo la onda sonora de los cicádidos se puede apreciar una melodía dulce y amable y minimalista, entre Krautrock y el ambient. Eso puede haber inspirado a tantos músicos que post Woodstock y la llegada del Hippismo, el bienestar físico, los alucinógenos y la búsqueda de las raíces humanas han encontrado en La Isla Blanca un espacio de inspiración (y por qué no experimentación) que con el tiempo fue evolucionando hacia lo que es hoy la cacofonía de las discotecas y los Djs.

Probablemente Syd Barret escribió Hipgnosis en la puerta del estudio donde se reunían a trabajar e intercambiar ideas lo que sería más tarde la máquina de música y espectáculo Pink Floyd. Hip (de hippie, de a la moda, guay) + Gnosis (conocimiento). El nombre fue utilizado por Aubrey Powell y Storm Togherson para nombrar a su estudio creativo que ha diseñado para los más grandes de la música internacional como Yes, Peter Gabriel, T-Rex, y un muy largo etcétera. Los Pink Floyd escogieron la isla como uno de sus centros de operaciones, donde podían alejarse da la mundanidad londinense y entrar a este mar de sombras, olivos y piedra caliza. Mike Outfileld le regaló al empresario internacional Richard Branson el éxito mundial de "The tubular Bell", un LP doble del cuál el segundo disco completo esta inspirado en el sonido de Ibiza y el color de sus aguas. Otro disco doble emblemático es Tago-Mago de Can editado en 1971 (año en que mueren Hausmann y Broner y se celebra el ISCID). Se dice que Jaki Liebezeit pasó un año entero encerrado pensando en una especie de habitación-cueva en el norte de la isla. Lo que veía en la pequeña abertura que daba al mar era un islote, cercano a la costa, el cuál le agradaba mucho y le servía como punto de conexión con el mundo. Más tarde al grabar el disco Jaki investigando un mapa cogió el nombre de Tagomago para el disco, y aunque la isla que él veía realmente no era Tagomago, el disco acabó consiguiendo la magia y el éxito de los proyectos que pasan por estas tierras.

Hoy es difícil pensar en todas las personalidades de la música que pasaron por la isla y los que cogieron inspiración de la misma, (de Freddy Mercury a Julio Iglesias) pero lo que es claro es que la energía vital del espacio es lo que lo convierte en el espacio mágico que es, en realidad y en imaginación.

Los tambores de Benirrás, crean una vibración sonora que puede generar en quien los siente una fuerza de movimiento interno difícil de conocer frente a cualquier otro instrumento o artefacto sonoro (quizás el chirrido de las cigarras). Comentan que este ritual se realiza en detrimento de ciertos cristales extraterrestres ocultos en algún sitio cercano a Las Dalias, y que los tambores pueden generar la vibración energética necesaria para conectar estos cristales con La Fuente madre, allá, en el espacio. Son juegos visuales y de palabras que ayudan a generar estos misterios o enigmas que alimentan el podér cognitivo en la isla. Ni siquiera ese poder cognitivo pudo evitar el incendio de Benirrás en 2010. Evacuados, destrucción y un mensaje directo de la tierra, un "desquite" contra el avance y el descuido. Un retroceso en los canales del progreso. La naturaleza necesita que podamos tener conciencia de ella, que no olvidemos que su existencia es lo nos permite ser y que nunca podremos estar sobre ella. Un incendio natural sería entendible, un proceso de reciclaje natural y mejora del espacio vital. Pero una negligencia humana, un descuido, una falta de atención no puede arrasar con un bosque con todo lo que esto significa, con todo lo que esto conlleva. Conejos, árboles, flores.

El "Angloparlante itinerante escultor Europeo" Barry Flanagan (así se autodenominaba: English-speaking itinerant European sculptor) dejó su vida (literalmente) en Santa Eulalia des Riu. Su mimado personaje de fábula Hare recorrió en su mente cada una de las colinas que recorren la isla que es donde pensó gran parte de su prolífica obra, rodeado de brisas mediterráneas y yacimientos púnicos. Toda su obra esparcida por el mundo tiene ese juego de complejidad, sintetismo y humor que podría parangonarse con la auténtica vida payesa. Todo su esplendor como artista encaja en la isla como un cubo de Rubik.

Difícil sería pensar que tanta cultura, en tanto tiempo y tantas épocas se hubiese equivocado. Por eso mismo, con esta exposición, seguimos rindiendo homenaje a esta isla maravillosa de encuentro. Única y exclusiva en el mundo (al menos el accesible en esta dimensión).