Lloc, lluny, llar
2020/2021
Walking as an artistic practice, art as a cartography of existence. A research project based on the journey of the Grand Tour 2020, the sixth edition of the walk organized each year by Nau Côclea in Catalan territory.
With the support of Nau Côclea and OSIC - Generalitat de Catalunya
The starting point of this research work has been the Grand Tour 2020, the sixth edition of the walk organized every year by Nau Côclea in Catalan territory. This year’s Tour took place between August 9 and 29, 2020, walking about 350 km from Tàrrega to the Centre d’Art i Natura de Farrera, during which more than twenty people have participated in an alternating way.
Of the 21 days of the trip, 15 were of linear displacement, 3 were dedicated to circular routes and 3 to rest. The main stages of the trip were: Tàrrega, Penelles, Balaguer, Sant Llorenç de Montgai, Les Avellanes, Àger, Barranc del Bosc (Moror), Collmorter, Tremp, Aramunt, La Pobla de Segur, Llaràs, Montardit de Baix, Altron, Llavorsí, Farrera.
As a guest artist-in-residence, I traveled the entire route, dedicating myself to collecting information and documenting the experience at a topographic, audiovisual and narrative level. The material generated was the raw material with which I developed the subsequent studio work.
The plastic work has been developed through the map, understood here in its original sense, as described by Sebastián de Covarrubias:
“Map, we call the table, canvas or paper where the universal earth is described, or particularly, it can come from mappa which means canvas or towel, and particularly the one that the Magistrates in the Circus games sent by signal for the games to commence, which was whitened or engredada, as if we say starched; because the canvas on which the earth and the sea and its parts are to be described is to be prepared in this way, they called it map and mappa mundi, and for this reason we also call these descriptions canvases, because they are on canvas” (Sebastián de Covarrubias, Tesoro de la lengua castellana or española (p. 539). Madrid, 1611).
The routes, the text, the experiences and the toponyms have become the fundamental elements of a language finalized to the construction of eight maps, passing from the topographic to the conceptual and, even further, to the abstraction of the territory.
Considering the journey as a metaphor of life and extending the question to the artist’s work, we can thus come to consider the results of this research as experiential maps and art in its extension as a cartography of existing.
- «Caminar los Pirineos», CDAN de Huesca y Fundación Hospital de Benasque
- «Fronteres. Línia de tall», Museu de l’Empordà, Figueres
- Grand Tour 2020 – Grand Tour
- ‘Lloc, lluny, llar’ la crònica del Grand Tour 2020
The route
The route - Grand Tour 2020 | Mapbox
Tour took place between August 9 and 29, 2020, walking about 350 km from Tàrrega to the Centre d’Art i Natura de Farrera, during which more than twenty people have participated in an alternating way.
- Routes day by day (Wikiloc)
- Entire tour (Google Maps)