Luis Garcia. «Pleita_y_cofin_24: The palm grove of La Berzosa»

09 de mayo  →  25 de Junio de 2022

We are at the end of the process. The general lights go out to give way to a story made up of installations, basketry crafts and a video that explains a fable originating in La Berzosa.

The coexistence between plants and animals and ideas such as biotransculturation, the bio-artisan and artisanal software are present in this unusual exhibition. A video captures the essence of the proposal. On the Life Sciences Campus in La Berzosa, Luis Gárciga, when picking up his drone, damaged in one of its propellers, meets some beings who come from Gondwana and who speak a strange language; however, the artist understands what they say. The creatures search for palm groves, necessary for their existence. In the Paseo del Prado in Madrid there was an orchard of palm trees planted in the 1920s of which there are hardly any copies left, but in a miscalculation and "temporary" braking these subjects appear in La Berzosa, surrounded by pines and holm oaks... just there there is some small palm tree trying to survive.

How can they return to their land? They must discover a password that Luis Gárciga helps them decipher through an escape game that follows the script of a fable. Through their investigations and with clues from the plant environment, they manage to find the key: Pleita_y_cofin_#24Then they disappear, leaving huge synthetic leatherette poufs or rather some seeds or grains of pollen that can be seen in the exhibition.

Engineer, artist, professor and researcher of Cuban origin. His transdisciplinary and investigative work focuses on various mnemonic resources from art, understanding the craft from a material and epistemological point of view. With an underlined interest in different Latin American countries where he has lived and worked and from a critical vision of technology, the works refer to sociocultural, economic and political events often with an anthropological and humorous interest. His handmade, audiovisual videomappings and relational works are based on his own concepts such as: "goat", "living cloud" and "democratic fetus".

Some of his artistic projects have been exhibited at the Mercosur Biennial (Brazil), the Havana Biennial (Cuba), the Biennial of the Americas (United States), the Santa Cruz de la Sierra Biennial (Bolivia), the Instituto Cervantes (Holland), the National Museum of Fine Arts of Cuba, the Loop Festival (Barcelona), the Matadero (Madrid), the San Francisco Art Institute, the MUCA Roma (Mexico City), the Queen Museum of Art (New York ), the Grenoble Art Institute (France) or the Beijing Today Art Museum (China). His work can be found in public and private collections in Europe and America.