While living in New York for three months in 2007, Marina Camargo produced several works which speak to the persuasive effect the space she inhabits has on her art. “There's a narrow relationship between my work and the cities I live in. Somehow the cities influence my point of view and thoughts.”
Her artistically inclined deconstructive tendencies sit well with maps and images of cities. She says that this interest lies in the “graphic elements that are present in our day to day lives.” In two of her New York pieces, Typography/Urbanization: NYC and Between Buildings, Camargo concludes that this “manifests itself as the deconstruction of a city map, as a way to make someone see text as an image, as an interference in the reconstruction of a landscape.”
The idea of conveying messages not inherent in their original forms is pervasive throughout Camargo’s work. Maps and plans, often created from a line similar to that used in the writing of text, are palimpsests of disaccorded, albeit stunning, visuals. Camargo purports to be “interested in elements that (she) encounters in daily life that have some kind of graphic quality, such as letters in a text or city maps.” Her everyday experiences provide her with “the initial impulse that frequently leads (her) to work with letters which become aesthetic objects or are conversely transmitters of misunderstandings.”
Words and letters take on a unique quality in her work. “There are some things in particular that I write, but it's not necessarily to be read.” For the most part, Camargo renders her work that includes text as “really deliberately unreadable.” This is apparent in several pieces, notably Spacing, Letters Falling, or Carbon-14.
In some cases, meaning is drawn not only from the physical form that the text inhabits, but from a knowledge of what the text originally represented. For example, Camargo describes the written work featured in The Shelting Sky - p.93 as being “very important to know that it is from a page in the book The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles. But”, she continues, “it's not essential to read it, just to know what it is.”
Camargo favors a multi-media approach in conveying her message, using “diverse materials and mediums (resources) as components of my research as an artist to produce my visual works, whether by means of photography, silkscreen, printing or creating objects and typographies.” That being said, Camargo, however, perceives her work as a “process very close to drawing.”
“I think of drawing as a possibility of visual thinking that materializes and is constructed visually – drawing does not necessarily define the form of the artwork. In this sense,” concludes Camargo, “I perceive my work – although the final result of each piece may vary, independent of the techniques and materials used.” The result of Camargo’s productions are often reminiscent of Ann Hamilton’s deconstructive or process-driven use of text and certainly akin to Derrida’s interest in the same.
As the artist is an avid reader of art history and philosophy, both the insight and combination of cerebral and aesthetic possibilities revealed are not surprising. “The philosophy of art interested me since I started studying the history of art, especially reading texts or interviews of artists,” she explained. “I really believe in the speech of the artist.”
Growing up in her native Brazil, Camargo was compelled toward artistic endeavor from an early age. “I’ve been interested in art since I was 14 years old, but at that time, I didn’t think to work with art as a main activity. It happened more like a necessity to do art rather than a rational choice.”
Camargo credits a varied bevy of artists, filmmakers, writers and musicians as her influences. From Sol LeWitt and Andreas Gurski to Giotto of Renaissance fame, she also includes Pedro Almodóvar and Radiohead among her interests. “I think the influence is not always obvious, neither direct.” Camargo continues, “it’s more like some tastes or identifications become part of our thoughts and open different ways to think about art.”
Camargo is currently working on a solo show in her home town of Porto Alegre, Brazil, and a collective project which began in 2007 called Percursos, or Paths in English. Working with fellow artist Romy Pocztaruk, the pair is organizing, as Camargo puts it, “an exhibition/performance that will take place in a bus during one night, with video projections on the city, sound works, performances, etc.” In the inaugural year of Percursos, the duo put out a worldwide call for artists resulting in a group exhibition which created a “path” in the city. A book will also be released to accompany the project in its entirety.
Jenelle Davis, New Orleans, 2009.
