Multimedia

With the phrase “Making as if Wondering: So What Is This?”, Eva Lootz (Vienna, 1940) alludes to a particular way of understanding the activity of art; namely, making, allowing a questioning of the world from scratch. Rooted in such an idea, this exhibition sets forth a panoramic journey through five decades of her career. Along with a selection of pieces Lootz recently donated to the Museo Reina Sofía, an ensemble of works is displayed for the first time, or reconstructed specifically for the occasion, with a strong focus on her drawings, which, straddling exploration and text, constitute a kind of parallel writing that has accompanied her research and work, at different points, as a bona fide diary.

This video features the durational piece Some Imperatives, which was performed in the Museo Reina Sofía from 29 September to 1 October 2023. The work was conceived by Tim Etchells, in collaboration with the Museo’s MA in Performing Arts and Visual Culture.

The activity took place inside the framework of the Expanded Theatricalities Chair, which is curated by the research-creation group ARTEA and centred on analysing the thought that inhabits stage and performance practices. This third edition, under the title Forced Entertainment. Things That Go Through Your Mind When Falling, was articulated around Etchells’ artistic and discursive trajectory and his work with the Forced Entertainment collective. The programme welcomed improvised and durational performances, as well as lectures, performance talks and screenings of video creations.  

From 2018 onwards, the Archipelago concert series invited the audience to delve deeper into the complexity of the contemporary world through listening, seeking to foreground music genres and modes of listening which provide an alternative to European and US cultural centres. This video, made by Javi Alvárez and Irene de Andrés, documents the seventh, and final, instalment of Archipelago, which was centred on El Hierro, a volcanic island which was considered prime meridian for centuries. Located halfway between Africa, Europe and South America, the island is also a metaphor for all music that circumvents the Western media’s powerful grid.

This edition featured the screening of the film Eles transportan a morte (2021), by film-maker’s Helena Girón and Samuel M. Delgado, from Galicia and Tenerife, respectively; a performance by the Folkloric Ensemble of Sabinosa; music by DJ Travella from Tanzania and Malian DJ Diaki; and a concert by the Sardinian ensemble Tenores di Bitti “Mialinu Pira”.

This video is the last stop in Notes for a Time Apart, a programme held in the Museo Reina Sofía from 30 June to 16 December 2023 with activities that looked to address other modes of conceiving time, beyond its normative and purely metric dimension. The programme was made up of a range of activities such as artistic and architectural installations, workshops, lectures, performances and encounters. The audiovisual piece here, which now works as a non-linear rapporteurship, gathers some of the gestures, sounds and encounters that took place, and aims to acknowledge and thank those who were willing to share time (and their time) during the programme.