ARTISTA EN PERFIL: Chaveli Sifre

We first encountered Chaveli Sifre and her art at Roberto Paradise when the gallery was located in a beautiful old wooden house on calle Hipodromo. We wrote about her exhibition, Fixed on the Scent of Light, in a June 12, 2013 article titled Chaveli Sifre: Scents and Sensibility. Since then, Sifre has moved to Berlin where she continues her art practice and sings with her pop band House of Life, while Roberto Paradise has relocated on calle Roberto H. Todd. We remained in contact with Sifre by way of Facebook, and were delighted when she posted an announcement for a one night project to be presented at La Estacion Espacial in the Miramar arts district which includes galeria Agustina Ferreyra and the recently announced El Museo de Arte y Diseno de Miramar, scheduled to open in 2018.

La Estacion Espacial, directed by Guillermoe Rodríguez and housed in a former bodega is a temporary platform for contemporary art created with the support of Beta-Local's La Practica project. La Estacion Espacial presents a continuing series of micro-exhibitions and seeks to open a local / international dialogue in the art community.

Sifre's description of her project Personal Attention said she would convert the exhibition space into a healing center employing different faiths, various rituals, and therapeutic methods – in particular the Japanese alternative medicine technique Reiki, which was developed in the 1920s by a Buddhist and has since become a world-wide phenomenon. The name is derived from the Japanese words rei – miraculous spirit, and ki – breath of life. Reiki masters claim that they are able to perceive a subject's ki-energy and determine if the life force is functioning at a high or low level. If the energy s low, a Reiki master can, by passing hands over the affected areas, transfer energy and improve the subject's health and happiness. This appealed to me because for many years I have suffered from tinnitus, a condition of the inner ear which fills my head with various ringing, roaring, buzzing, clicking and hissing sounds. Apparently listening to rock and roll music at very high volume when I was in my twenties caused this. Now that I am nearly a septuagenarian, I am haunted by the echoes of my youth. There are no cures for tinnitus, no medications and no operations which can silence the background noise. I've tried various homeopathic treatments, but they had no effect.  

When I told Lillian about Sifre's project and insisted that we attend the performance, she treated me to a series of Ricky jokes about Ricky Rosello, Ricky Riccardo, Rikki Tiki Tavi - Rudyard Kipling's mongoose, and that joke about Ricky Martin changing a light bulb. Arriving at La Estacion Espacial, we found many people outside the storefront. Inside it was calm and serene. The wall opposite the entrance was covered in a large diaphanous fabric that rippled gently with two fans providing a cooling breeze. I learned from Sifre that the fabric was professionally dyed using two colors certified by Pantone corporation, the international arbiter of color popularity. Each year Pantone names a color of the year. For 2016 they picked two colors: number 13-1520, Rose Quartz and number 15-3919 Serenity. Pantone attempts to lead the marketplace with their color choices. They say, “As consumers seek mindfulness and well-being as antidotes to modern day stress, we join together Rose Quartz and Serenity (a warm embracing rose tone and a cooler tranquil blue) to effect a soothing sense of order and peace.” Sifre has literally joined those two colors in a subtle blend from rose to blue creating a gentle mauve where they mix together.

In the center of the exhibition space Sifre installed a sinusodial sculpture made from metal mesh painted an aqua color. The center peak serves as a bench where a person sits when having a Reiki session. Two Reiki masters dressed in matching white tunics imprinted with various religious symbols simultaneously apply their no-touch massage therapy, while the subject, facing away from the audience, can contemplate the slowly wafting fabric or dream their own thoughts as the treatment progresses. I watched two patients being treated while I waited for my own session to begin.

Meanwhile, Sifre explained a video she had installed on a small monitor in one corner of the room which can be watched while sitting on a soft white cushion imprinted with the same symbols as the Reiki robes. This video is designed to induce ASMR in the viewer. ASMR was named in 2010 by a New York cybersecurity professional. When watching and listening to security monitors for long periods, she would feel a subtle sensation of tingling and euphoria, starting on the scalp and moving down the neck resulting in a kind of spine-tingling brain orgasm. She named this sensation Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response and started a Facebook Group to share her experience. Sight or sound can cause the sensation. Repetitive sounds can trigger a response. This might explain the feeling that I often have of fingers caressing the top of my head and the back of my neck. It could be that the repeated ringing and clicking noise of the tinnitus in my ears is causing an ASMR response on my skin. I was asking Sifre about this when her assistant told me it was time for my Reiki session.  

Watching others receive Reiki made me realize that not only are they the subjects of the treatment, but they are the material of Siefre's art. The Reiki masters, acting on Sifre's behalf, sculpt and mold the energy field of the person under their treatment, adding or subtracting ki and altering the subjects overall mood and well-being. As I sat down on the sculpture bench to begin my session, I realized that I know what it is like to be the subject of an art work – a portrait or a self-portrait, and the object of an art work – the viewer or the recipient, but never before have I been the actual material from which the art is being made. Not only that, but this art work, of which I am the material, if successful, will remain with me after I leave the exhibition and if it has any long-term effects might continue to exist in the days ahead.

I decided to keep my eyes open and stare straight ahead at the soothing color of the curtain in front of me. Because I have an age-related eye condition, I am not able to see well on the periphery, so I did not see the two Reiki practitioners as they begin working their way around my body. I did feel my hair begin to stand up – on my head and the back of my neck, and I swear I could see waves of energy flowing in the space between me and the curtain. The curtain moves in the breeze, but I saw separate, distinct waves rising from the area near my waist then floating away, above my head. A sense of peace began to overtake me when the Reiki master touched me on the shoulder to say that my session had ended. I stood up slowly and thanked them both for the personal attention.

Back outside, I found Lillian in conversation with a small group of artists. “They were just telling me about TMS,” she said. “Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation. It's a new scientific technique that uses electrical pulses to stimulate the brain. A writer for the New Yorker described how TMS made him feel like a savant when he tried it. He was smarter and excelled at mental tests and mathematics. And another writer, with no skills in drawing, made remarkable pictures while under TMS stimulation.Let's try it,” she exclaimed.

I wonder what effect it would have on my hearing or my vision.

Note: Chaveli Sifre, House of Life, Roberto Paradise, En Rojo, La Estacion Espacial, Galeria Agustina Ferreyra, Guillermoe Rodríguez, Beta-Local, Reiki Puerto Rico, Ricky Rosello, Ricky Riccardo, Rikki Tiki Tavi, Ricky Martin, Pantone, ASMR Preliminary Research, Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation and the New Yorker are all available on Facebook.

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Jan Galligan sharing a drink with Tonino near the top of el CERRO.

Lillian Mulero, stopping in a shady spot, half way up the hill of el CERRO.

El CERRO is an ongoing project by artist Chemi Rosado-Seijo of San Juan, PR -- located in the el Cerro community of Naranjito, PR 30 miles south of San Juan in the foothills of the central mountainous corridor. 

Chemi says, "for the first time in 14 years we present to the general public The El Cerro Project in the beautiful community known as el Cerro in Naranjito, Puerto Rico. Since 2002, we worked with the residents to paint their houses with different shades of green to so honor the design and spontaneous architecture of this community. In addition, we are offering creative workshops, training and other activities of social impact for the community.

During this past year, thanks to the financial support of an "Artist as Activist" grant from the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation, we were able to paint more than 60 residences and impact the economy of  this community helping many residents become proficient at the skill of painting -- some have even turned professional."

ABOUT THE PROJECT

more photos here ...

Pleasantly surprised to have a surprise drop-in by a young friend of many years, and his family for our FINAL FRIDAY ART SALE & SHOW yesterday -- during our end of an era, one-time-only clearance event. Big ups and shout-outs all around.

note: he won the 3-CONE MONTY game giving him the opportunity to take home any artwork of his choosing. Flattered that he picked something from Lillian & Jan, and passed on the Cory Arcangel, the Felix Gonzales Torres/Christopher Wool, & the Jasper Johns.

Historical Note (via the Museum of Modern Art, archives)

Avalanche was co-founded by Liza Béar and Willoughby Sharp in New York City in 1968. The impetus for the magazine's creation was to intentionally challenge the more critic-based, formalist-driven, art journals such as Art Forum. The mission of Avalanche was to give artists a voice, a space to discuss their works, their creative processes, and even their political opinions. Béar and Sharp focused their attention on those artists who circulated in avant-garde circles of the 1960s and 1970s, both in New York and internationally. They paid particular attention to those artists who considered themselves practitioners of Conceptual, Post-Minimalist, Earth, performance and video art ...

Each issue included artist interviews, extensive photographic spreads, and textual documents of various artists' works. Additionally, each issue (except for issues no. 6 and no. 9) included a "Rumbles" section, which promoted and described current art world events as well as recent publications and artist messages. 

The thirteenth and final issue of Avalanche was published in the summer of 1976. Production ceased largely due to finacial strains. Béar and Sharp were transparent about the magazine's economic troubles by choosing to reproduce a page of their ledger book on its final cover.

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Trienal Poli/Gráfica de San Juan event : checked in @ Walter Otero Contemporary Art with Peter Rawley, Betty Kaplan & 183 others. Photo via WOCA, animation by Jan Galligan

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When we first moved to the island, we made weekly trips to Border's bookstore in Plaza Las Americas. We'd rarely go seeking a specific book; normally we were guided by serendipity. Lillian would browse the bookshelves, I would surf the magazines then we would meet in the cafe for coffee and pastry to share our discoveries. It was a disappointment when they went bankrupt. We wandered, a bit aimlessly, for months.

Bookstores come and bookstores go. Cronopios, a used bookstore and cafe in Santurce closed. Things improved when Libros AC opened on Ponce de Leon, with a bookstore, bar and cafe. A good book is improved by coffee, but is even better accompanied with a glass of wine or a shot of rum.

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photo by Jan Galligan, 2015

ADAL MALDONADO  (more info)

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by Jan Galligan and Lillian Mulero
Santa Olaya, PR

Last August, photographer/artist, Adal Maldonado invited his 2500 followers to become a part of an art exhibition at Roberto Paradise gallery by uploading a selfie photograph to his Facebook page. “There are no restrictions,” said Adal. “It can celebrate or criticize narcissism, or it can be an act of artistic intention.” Over 500 people responded to his invitation, which was also a challenge and a rebuke. Adal's challenge was an attempt to try to move selfie pictures away from static self-images towards a more artistic interpretation of the self. The rebuke is implicit in the title. 

Go Fuck Yourself, entered the published lexicon in 1836 when a Boston woman was convicted of public obscenity after calling a group of women “bloody whores” and telling them to “go fuck themselves.” Adal seems to say that selfies, in their generic format are not worth the effort, “fuck them” while also condemning such images as masturbatory self-indulgences.

The Ultimate Selfie (detail) Adal Maldonado, 2014

As Adal said in one of his ongoing News from Nowhere postings: Selfies are a cybernet reflection of the f-cked up way society teaches young people that their most important quality is their physical attractiveness. I propose that posting a more thoughtful or creative selfie or the selfie as political activism or an intentionally unattractive selfie can be ways to explore issues of body image as a reaction against the narcissism or over-sexualization of the typical selfie.

The first selfie, or photographic self-portrait, is attributed to Robert Cornelius, an American pioneer in photography, who produced a daguerreotype of himself in 1839 which was also one of the first photographs of a person. The modern internet-based selfie first appeared on MySpace and was soon supplanted by thousands of self-portraits published on Facebook, starting around 2005, and characterized as “amateurish, flash-blinded self-portraits, often taken in front of a bathroom mirror.” These self-images quickly evolved to photos, mostly of young females, shot from a high angle which exaggerate the size of the eyes and give a flattering impression of a slender pointed chin. In 2007, Apple introduced the iPhone which featured a camera lens not only on the back of the camera body, the standard mode for taking pictures, but also on the front, designed to provide a picture of the user when the phone is used for FaceTime or Skype conversations. People immediately exploited this feature as a means to make still-image self portraits, in a manner that was easier and faster, and which allow users complete control over how they present themselves.

Ease of use and user control are what appealed most to Adal in issuing his invitation. In response to an inquiry on his Facebook page, he replied, “This project is … evolving in many interesting directions. It began when I agreed to exhibit my auto-portraits at Roberto Paradise in Santurce. Reflecting on how the expo might also have a current urgency and noticing how a cybernet pop culture has sprung up around the selfie - although mostly concerned narcissistic issues - I thought that it might be interesting if I started an anti-selfie page called Go Fuck Your Selfie and encouraged my artist friends and the general public to upload selfies … to me it seems like we are redefining the selfie as artistic expression.”

This past year has seen a world-wide explosion of selfies. The online mobile photo-sharing and social networking service Instagram reports an astounding 53 million photographs labeled with the hashtag #selfie. According to a Time magazine article, the Philippines, New York City, Miami, Malaysia, and Los Angeles are among the most popular places in the world for selfies. This has led to a proliferation of selfie-related terminology including: Selfie Face, Selfie Arm, Selfie Addict, Selfie-Holic, Selfie Session, Selfie Thursday, Selfie Overload. The Urban Dictionary defines Selfie-Obsessed as “a person so self-obsessed that they post copious amounts of selfies on social media with no purpose other than to say "Look at me!" They do this in hopes of getting 'likes' and comments telling them they are good looking since that is their way of validating their looks and sense of self(ie)-worth.”

How people see themselves and how they choose to depict themselves in public was definitively explored by the sociologist Erving Goffman in his seminal 1959 book, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, the first study to treat face-to-face interactions as a sociological subject. Goffman's insight was to define and interpret those interactions as private theatrical performances presented in public. By applying terminology of the theater to personal interactions, Goffman demonstrated that in everyday encounters, people could best present themselves by: believing in the role they are playing, generally a different role for each person encountered; using dramatic effect when confronting others, especially to emphasize what they most want to convey; presenting an idealized version of themselves which adds a feeling of significance to the encounter; seeking to maintain control of their expressions, either to maximize what they are presenting, or to conceal what they do not wish to present; creating a sense of mystification about themselves, which helps to maintain social distance in the observer; and finally seeking to maintain a distinction between the real and the contrived, in themselves and their presentations.

Taken together, these precepts can provide a step by step guide for the creation of selfie photographs that can then have an impact on the social media audience. Yet more work is required to move these images from the social medium to the realm of art. Can selfies be art? Art critic Jerry Saltz has written recently in their defense. He says that it is rare for a new genre to appear in art, but he considers selfies to be a type of self-portraiture formally distinct from all others in history, distinguished by their being boring, silly, casual, improvised, fast, and nearly always taken at arm's length unless a mirror is employed. Nonetheless, he considers them significant. Meanwhile a war of words is taking place in the art critical arena. Some writers have joined Saltz in his call to include selfies as legitimate works of art. Others have taken a strong stance against the possibility that selfies might ever be considered art.

THE FABRIC OF LIFE
by Jan Galligan and Lillian Mulero
Santa Olaya, PR

“Are you sure you have all the documents we need?” asks Lillian. “I think so,” I tell her. We have carefully prepared for our third annual trip to secure the registration for our car. We know that this can be an all day ordeal, so we have brought books, magazines, puzzles, games, water and snacks, along with all the paperwork related to the car and our residence. We are nearing the front of the line and soon will have our audience with the Department of Transportation clerk. I sort through the papers again. “Uh, I think I left last year's registration form in the car,” I confess to Lillian. This can be a fatal omission. Last year, after waiting on line at the Bayamon DTOP office for nearly five hours, when we presented our material to the clerk, we were missing the proof for the physical address of our house, and had to drive back to Santa Olaya to retrieve that document, and then return to DTOP and rejoin the endless line snaking through the office. This year, we are better prepared, and as well we have come to the DTOP office in Caguas, where we had heard, the lines are shorter. This is true. “I'll be right back,” I tell Lillian, as I run for the car to retrieve the missing document before she reaches the front of the line.

We need to finish our quest within one hour, because we have an appointment to meet the artist Natalia Martinez at AREA art space, for a tour of her exhibition. As well as having a more efficient bureaucracy, we have discovered that Caguas aggressively promotes and supports the arts. In addition to the Museo de Arte, there is also Museo de Caguas, Museo del Tabaco, Casa del Trovadore (singer), Casa del Compositor (writer), and the Museo de Artes Popular, all supported by the city government. AREA is a private enterprise started 10 years ago by José Hernández Castrodad as “a place for the exchange of arguments, critical thinking and the development and presentation of art projects that seek to make connections between artists in and out of Puerto Rico.” Natalia Martinez is presenting her work along with two other exhibitions: Visual Identity, is a collaboration between visiting artist in residence Julie Sass of Denmark and Ivelisse Jimenez, who lives and works in San Juan, and features work made during Sass's residency at AREA; Lujan Perez, a young spanish artist living in Florida, presents a series of portraits tightly cropped to the head and shoulders, large format drawings and woodcut prints, titled En Busqueda de Lilliath. (Searching for Lilliath).

The exhibition, Sobre amor y otros cosas, (About love and other things) by Natalia Martinez should be considered an installation. Each work illustrates a different perspective of her overall concept of assembling a group of objects which at first seem unremarkable and unrelated. Because of the way they are placed they appear to be devotional objects, imbued with nostalgia. Because each object has a history, they become talismans or souvenirs, and their meaning acquires significance, giving them a substance you otherwise would not expect.

The eight works on display are objects she has found, collected or been given over a number of years. The most simple, yet most poignant, is a single page from a well worn, used paperback copy of Julio Cortazar's book Un Tal Lucas, which Martinez purchased years ago from a street vendor in Caguas. She was so enamored of Cortozar's story, a series of disjointed observations that manage to present a complex portrait of Lucas, that she read and re-read the book until it literally fell apart. She has preserved this page, pressed between two sheets of glass and mounted in a frame.

In the middle of the gallery floor sits a rusted, crumpled sheet of corrugated tin roofing which looks like it has been folded in half. In fact, this panel was blown from the roof of her family's house in Juncos during hurricane Hugo, which devastated the island in 1989, when Martinez was in grade school. Her family's house was destroyed and the roof panel ended up wrapped around a tree, where it remained until last year when it finally fell to the ground.

Next to this, also on the floor, sits a rusted tin can, the type used to water plants when tending to the garden. This can belonged to Henry and Else Klumb, and was given to Martinez by artist Jorge Gonzalez while he was working on the gardens at Casa Klumb in Rio Piedras. Martinez has filled the can with a large plant from her own patio garden at her home in Santurce.

A few years ago, another artist friend, Joe Leon, gave Martinez a collection of materials he had inherited from the house of his grandmother, a cuban immigrant, whose profession was a seamstress, and who over many years amassed a large collection of fabrics, patterns and materials used while making dresses for her clients. These included the remnants of hundreds of dresses carefully rolled and tied with ribbons. In addition there were paper and plastic bags filled with fabrics cut to size according to specific patterns for customers who for various reasons never returned to complete their order. Each bag is labeled with the customer's name and a description of the dress that was to have been made.

Among the fabrics from Joe's grandmother, Martinez found a pile of deteriorating brightly colored material. She divided the pile and nailed one half to the wall. Then she tacked the other half onto the wall, and when it was secure, she removed the nail, letting it fall to the ground. She titled this work, Rainbow falling.

Mounted on the wall is a white wooden shelf that holds two small birds nests, which Martinez collected from her garden. Each nest contains threads and bits of fabric she had discarded while sitting on her patio and working on sewing projects. She considers this work a collaboration between herself and the birds that visited her patio over many seasons.

Nearby are two other pieces of fabric, plain off-white linen, draped side by side from two hooks. Next to them is a small rectangular metal souvenir copy of Rene Magritte's painting, The Lovers, which she purchased in a museum gift shop last year. In Magritte's painting, the lovers kiss, but each has their head shrouded in fabric. “Our secret desire,” wrote Magritte, “is for a change in the order of things.”

“Did you get the paperwork?” asks Lillian, when I return, panting and out of breath. She is now the next person in line. “Yes,” I tell her. “Good,” she says, “but next year, I'll be the one who gathers everything together before we leave on our visit to the Department of Transportation. By the way,” she asks, “are there any good restaurants here in Caguas?” “I'm not sure,” I tell her, “let me check the Yelp listings for Caguas downtown. Do you want Middle Eastern food? We haven't had tahini or tabbouleh in a long time, and the restaurant Los Olivos is showing four stars.”

Natalia Martinez @ AREA

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