Calvari, Riba-roja d’Ebre, Catalunya
‘Calvari’ is a new installation produced in a site specific location within the village of Riba-roja d’Ebre, Tarragona, Catalunya. The work is produced in response to the name and previous use of the space, Calvariformerly used as a laundry, houses 2 large concrete troughs. The work takes inspiration from the idea of washing, cleansing, purifying and the binary of black and white, light and dark and life and death. It’s a play with the space, the troughs and the cracks in the walls. It also introduces casts from fig tree leaves, concerned with its ability to grow through broken concrete, through a crack in the wall and to be re-born from complete desecration.
“I took plaster impressions of fig leaves and used these in one of the troughs along with all the broken pieces and mistakes. I washed the walls with white paint and then burned fig branches to make charcoal and drew with this to accentuate cracks in the building. I’ve placed the burnt wood in the second trough on a bed of plaster dust. It’s as if one cannot exist without the other. I’ve written 2 phrases on the walls of the space, ‘the leaves of the fig tree symbolise growth and rebirth’ and ‘ens va salvar mitjancant la neteja de la regeneracio i la renovacio’ which translates as ‘he saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal’.” The artist.
