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Francisca Kweitel: Poética de la sutileza
La percibo como una gran maestra en su arte, mientras me dice que sigue
aprendiendo… La obra de Francisca Kweitel en el lobby de Home Hotel.Titular de la cátedra de diseño de accesorios Kweitel-Kohon (FADU/UBA, carrera de diseño e indumentaria), Francisca Kweitel sostiene su cabello siempre corto, con uno o dos clips sencillos. No es una contrariedad: quien tiene el encanto de conocerla, sabrá que es una persona simple, en el sentido más complejo posible que podamos imaginar... Francisca alimenta su alma sentada a la sombra, leyendo libros de Tao. Pausada, pero inquieta y apasionada en su arte.
Francisca -artista que admiro por su cualidad humana y poética- nos convidó con una obra para la edición de primavera de Latido en Home Hotel, y nos hizo llorar con el video dedicado a su padre en la premio Itaú Cultural 2013: obra emotiva, cargada de potencia estética, por la cual obtuvo el segundo premio.
Comparto con ustedes, las preguntas que creé para conocer en profundidad a los artistas que participan de Latido.
+ ¿Qué te inspira? ¿Qué buscás?
FK Si supiera qué busco, podría haberlo encontrado, ¿y entonces qué haría? Busco. Qué me interesa, qué me inquieta, qué deseo verdaderamente, adentro, bien adentro.
+ ¿Podés definir belleza?
+ ¿Podés definir belleza?
FK Son pequeños momentos, miradas, lo que me hace suspirar, o me pone la piel de gallina. Creo que la belleza es algo que se siente en el cuerpo. Para algunos, monstruoso; para otros, un embelesamiento, una pasión, contemplación, un paréntesis que hace suspender el tiempo y espacio, para dedicarle tu completa atención. Un estado. Para cada uno, lo suyo...
+ ¿Qué artistas te influyeron?
+ ¿Qué artistas te influyeron?
FK Te puedo decir artistas cuyas obras me atrapan, y otros que lo hacen más con su palabra, pero no sé si influyen o de qué modo lo hacen, en mi trabajo... Sin pensar demasiado, se me vienen a la cabeza Kiki Smith, Joseph Beuys, Henrique Oliveira, Ramón Puig Cuyas (mi maestro de joyería en Barcelona), y un montón de personas que me voy cruzando en la vida, que no son artistas reconocidos por el mundo, pero para mí son magníficos, maravillosos y grandes maestros de vida.
+ ¿Cómo surge tu arte? ¿Cual es tu metáfora?
FK Busco el aire que me falta. Ser un montón de partículas flotando lentamente. Hacer me ayuda a ser un todo, y a no tener siempre una pata más corta.
+ ¿Cómo es tu proceso creativo? ¿Trabajás con un concepto o es intuitivo, impulsivo?
FK ¡Uffffff! Pienso mucho. Me encanta sentarme fuera, a la sombra, y dejar que las ideas, recuerdos, conversaciones y fantasías vayan pasando. Casi no dibujo, casi no escribo; todo lo guardo dentro mío. Hago poco. Una mezcla de debates internos dilatantes, y la culpa de traer más objetos a este mundo tan abarrotado de cosas horribles y maravillosas. Un día me pongo a hacer, y voy viendo qué sale. Me gusta hacerlo simple; me abruman las ideas que están fuera de mis posibilidades caseras, tengo que poder abordarlo fácilmente, haciendo.
+ ¿Cómo describirías tu estética? ¿Qué te distingue o diferencia, cuál es tu sello, qué te identifica?
+ ¿Cómo describirías tu estética? ¿Qué te distingue o diferencia, cuál es tu sello, qué te identifica?
FK No lo tengo. No soy especialista en nada. Hago lo que se me da la gana en el formato y técnica que me entusiasme en el momento. Me divierte la posibilidad de aprender lo que sea necesario en el momento preciso, y ser un poco irreverente con los tecnicismos. Así de ecléctico puede verse mi trabajo, y no me interesa tenerlo controlado. Son como post-it, recordatorios de momentos de mi vida. No consigo mantener la información en mi cabeza mucho tiempo; a veces quiero escribir algo que acabo de escuchar, y cuando apoyo el lápiz, ya no sé de que se trataba. Atravesar ciertas experiencias -con todo el cuerpo- y materializarlas de algún modo, me ayuda a capturar no sólo imágenes o palabras, sino sensaciones que de otro modo perdería casi por completo.
+ ¿Tu taller, tu espacio de trabajo? ¿Tu universo?
FK Mi universo es mi casa. Es donde vivo con mi marido, mis gatos y mis plantas, quienes me gusta tener alrededor. No tengo taller; se tiene que poder hacer en casa... Me pone nerviosa pensar en pagar todos los meses un alquiler (prefiero el trueque como formato de intercambio), y no me gusta tener que pensar a largo plazo.
+ ¿Qué es arte? ¿Qué es contemporáneo?
FK No sé. Podría sentarme días a escribir al respecto, pero la respuesta forma parte de infinitos debates, que siempre están dando vueltas y se reconstruye permanentemente.
+ ¿Creés que existe un arte o diseño argentino, que podemos identificar el gen y apartarlo?
+ ¿Creés que existe un arte o diseño argentino, que podemos identificar el gen y apartarlo?
FK Prefiero no establecerlo de ese modo. Me parece que debe haber algo que se está construyendo permanentemente, y que lo que identifique el arte/diseño argentino de hoy; se verá más claramente dentro de unos 100 años. Materiales, modos, técnicas, pueden ser lo que nos vayan definiéndolo, aunque en este mundo globalizado, se van diluyendo los límites tan marcados. Sí hay algo del “sálvense quien pueda”, que nos dan las crisis argentinas, que nos vuelve muy despiertos a la hora de generar, logrando que la falta no sea un problema, sino un despertador.
+ ¿Cómo ves la escena del arte local en Argentina, Latinoamérica y el mundo?
FK ¡Me queda muy grande la pregunta! Si bien estudio mucho, porque mi trabajo y curiosidad lo implican, también vivo un poco emburbujada, porque la inmensidad de información me supera. Hay mucha gente haciendo mucho, y eso me parece maravilloso, la gente necesita expresarse y da vueltas interesantes.
+ ¿Qué estás mirando? ¿Qué artistas recomendás ver y seguir?
FK Todo lo que alcanzo. En mi mesa de luz, está el libro de neurociencia de Manes, el Tao Te King y el maestro ignorante de J.Ranciere. A lado de la tele, un pilón de pelis para ver, muchas de las que pasa poco, lento o silencioso, y poco de bombardeo tecnológico multicolor. Internet es infinito... Facebook es un centro de información inmenso de artistas no consagrados, donde libremente muestran lo que hacen, sin preocuparse por los reparos que tienen en una Web (que siempre están "en construcción"). Ver a todos. Seguir a ninguno.
+ Tu próximo proyecto, exhibición.
+ Tu próximo proyecto, exhibición.
FK Proyectos... Siempre hay muchas cosas dando vueltas. Me gusta la gestión de talleres para hacer actividades grupales, y pensar en abrir puertas para mostrar los trabajos de los alumnos (Diseno de Accesorios Cat.Kweitel-Kohon, FADU, UBA) en Argentina y en el mundo.
Exponer yo, no. Nunca hice una individual, quizás llegue alguna vez, pero por ahora, no siento para nada esa necesidad.+
Exponer yo, no. Nunca hice una individual, quizás llegue alguna vez, pero por ahora, no siento para nada esa necesidad.+
Latido nuclea proyectos visuales contemporáneos argentinos, realiza exhibiciones de arte y diseño, y promueve libros y objetos de autor, así como productos de diseño. Fabián Trigo es su director creativo.
Francisca Kweitel: Poetics of subtlety
I see her as a great master of her art, while she assures she’s still learning… Francisca Kweitl’s work in the lobby of the Home Hotel.
By: Fabián Trigo for L A T I D O
I see her as a great master of her art, while she assures she’s still learning… Francisca Kweitl’s work in the lobby of the Home Hotel.
By: Fabián Trigo for L A T I D O
Head of the Kweitel-Kohon accessory design course (Fashion Design studies, FADU/UBA), Francisca Kweitel always wears her hair short, with one or two simple clips. This is no contradiction: whoever has the pleasure of meeting her will see she’s a simple person, in the most complex way we can imagine… Francisca nourishes her soul sitting in the shade, reading Taoist books. Unhurried, but restless and passionate about her art.
Francisca -an artist I admire for her human and poetic quality- offered us one of her pieces for the Spring edition of Latido at the Home Hotel, and she brought tears to our eyes with the video dedicated to her father for the Itaú Cultural award 2013: an emotional piece, loaded with aesthetic power, for which she received the second prize.
Here I’m sharing with you the questions I came up with to get to know the artists that participate in Latido in depth.
Francisca -an artist I admire for her human and poetic quality- offered us one of her pieces for the Spring edition of Latido at the Home Hotel, and she brought tears to our eyes with the video dedicated to her father for the Itaú Cultural award 2013: an emotional piece, loaded with aesthetic power, for which she received the second prize.
Here I’m sharing with you the questions I came up with to get to know the artists that participate in Latido in depth.
+ What inspires you? What are you looking for?
FK If I knew what I was looking for, I might have found it, and then what would I do? I look. For what interests me, what moves me, what I really want, inside, deep inside.
FK If I knew what I was looking for, I might have found it, and then what would I do? I look. For what interests me, what moves me, what I really want, inside, deep inside.
+ Could you define beauty?
FK It’s little moments, looks, what makes me sigh, or gives me goosebumps. I think beauty is something you feel in your body. For some people, it’s monstrous; for others, a fascination/bewitchment, a passion, contemplation, a parenthesis that makes time and space stop, forcing you to give it your complete attention. A state. For each person, his own…
FK It’s little moments, looks, what makes me sigh, or gives me goosebumps. I think beauty is something you feel in your body. For some people, it’s monstrous; for others, a fascination/bewitchment, a passion, contemplation, a parenthesis that makes time and space stop, forcing you to give it your complete attention. A state. For each person, his own…
+ What artists have influenced you?
FK I can name artists that captivate me with their work, and others that do so more with their words, but I’m not sure if they influence my work, nor in what way… Without giving it too much thought, Kiki Smith, Joseph Beuys, Henrique Oliveira, Ramón Puig Cuyas (my jewelry master in Barcelona) come to my mind, as well as a bunch of other people that I’ve come across in life, that are not renown artists but to me are magnificent, wonderful and great masters of life.
FK I can name artists that captivate me with their work, and others that do so more with their words, but I’m not sure if they influence my work, nor in what way… Without giving it too much thought, Kiki Smith, Joseph Beuys, Henrique Oliveira, Ramón Puig Cuyas (my jewelry master in Barcelona) come to my mind, as well as a bunch of other people that I’ve come across in life, that are not renown artists but to me are magnificent, wonderful and great masters of life.
+ How does your art emerge? What is your metaphor?
FK I look for the air that I’m lacking. To be a bunch of particles floating slowly. Doing helps me become a whole, and to not always have a leg shorter than the other.
FK I look for the air that I’m lacking. To be a bunch of particles floating slowly. Doing helps me become a whole, and to not always have a leg shorter than the other.
+ What is your creative process like? Do you work with a concept or is it intuitive, impulsive?
FK Uffffff! I think a lot. I love to sit outside, in the shade, and let ideas, memories, conversations and fantasies go by. I hardly draw, I hardly write; I keep everything inside myself. I don’t do much. A mix of internal postponing debates, and guilt for bringing more objects into this world so full of horrible and wonderful things. One day I start doing and then I see what gradually comes up. I like to do things simply; I’m overwhelmed by ideas that are out of my homemade reach; I have to be able to approach it easily, by doing.
+ How would you describe your aesthetics? What distinguishes or differentiates you, what is your signature, what identifies you?
FK I don’t have one. I’m not a specialist in any field. I do what I feel like in the format and technique that I’m excited about at the moment. I’m amused by the possibility of learning whatever it takes at the precise moment, and of being a little disrespectful of technicalities. My work can get very eclectic, and I don’t care about keeping it under control. It’s like post-its, reminders of moments in my life. I’m not able to keep information in my head for a long time; sometimes I want to write something down that I just heard, and when I put the pencil on paper, I can’t remember what it was about anymore. Going through certain experiences –with my whole body- and materializing them in some way, helps me capture not only images or words, but also feelings that I would lose almost completely any other way.
+ What about your workshop, your workspace? Your universe?
FK My universe is my home. It is where I live with my husband, my cats and my plants, which I love to have around. I don’t have a workshop; I have to be able to work at home… It makes me nervous to think about paying rent every month (I prefer barter as a form of exchange), and I don’t like having to think of the long term.
+ What is art? What is contemporary?
FK I don’t know. I could sit for days to write about this, but the answer is a part of infinite debates, that are always going around and are permanently reconstructed.
FK I don’t have one. I’m not a specialist in any field. I do what I feel like in the format and technique that I’m excited about at the moment. I’m amused by the possibility of learning whatever it takes at the precise moment, and of being a little disrespectful of technicalities. My work can get very eclectic, and I don’t care about keeping it under control. It’s like post-its, reminders of moments in my life. I’m not able to keep information in my head for a long time; sometimes I want to write something down that I just heard, and when I put the pencil on paper, I can’t remember what it was about anymore. Going through certain experiences –with my whole body- and materializing them in some way, helps me capture not only images or words, but also feelings that I would lose almost completely any other way.
+ What about your workshop, your workspace? Your universe?
FK My universe is my home. It is where I live with my husband, my cats and my plants, which I love to have around. I don’t have a workshop; I have to be able to work at home… It makes me nervous to think about paying rent every month (I prefer barter as a form of exchange), and I don’t like having to think of the long term.
+ What is art? What is contemporary?
FK I don’t know. I could sit for days to write about this, but the answer is a part of infinite debates, that are always going around and are permanently reconstructed.
+ Do you think there is an Argentine art or design, that we can identify its gene and isolate it?
FK I’d rather not put it like that. I think there must be something that is being constantly constructed, and that what identifies Argentine art/design today is going to be seen more clearly in about a hundred years. Materials, modes, techniques, can be the features that progressively define it, although in this globalized world, distinct limits are being diluted. Argentine crisis do convey a sense of “every man for himself”, that make us very alert when it comes to generating, turning lack into a wake up call, not a problem.
FK I’d rather not put it like that. I think there must be something that is being constantly constructed, and that what identifies Argentine art/design today is going to be seen more clearly in about a hundred years. Materials, modes, techniques, can be the features that progressively define it, although in this globalized world, distinct limits are being diluted. Argentine crisis do convey a sense of “every man for himself”, that make us very alert when it comes to generating, turning lack into a wake up call, not a problem.
+ How do you see the local art scene in Argentina, Latin America and the world?
FK That’s too big of a question! Although I do study a lot, because my work and my curiosity demand it, I also live a bit inside a bubble, because the immensity of information overwhelms me. There are a lot of people doing a lot of things, and I think that is wonderful, people need to express themselves and they take interesting turns.
+ What are you looking at? What artists would you recommend seeing and following?
FK Everything I can reach. On my bedside table I have Manes’ book on neurosciences, the Tao Te King and The Ignorant Schoolmaster by J. Ranciere. Next to the TV I have a pile of movies to watch, most of them are of the type where not much takes place, slow or quiet, and just a few technological multicolored bombarding ones. . Internet is infinite… Facebook is an immense information center of unknown artists, that freely show what they do, without the worries that come with a website (which is always “under construction”). See everybody. Follow no one.
FK That’s too big of a question! Although I do study a lot, because my work and my curiosity demand it, I also live a bit inside a bubble, because the immensity of information overwhelms me. There are a lot of people doing a lot of things, and I think that is wonderful, people need to express themselves and they take interesting turns.
+ What are you looking at? What artists would you recommend seeing and following?
FK Everything I can reach. On my bedside table I have Manes’ book on neurosciences, the Tao Te King and The Ignorant Schoolmaster by J. Ranciere. Next to the TV I have a pile of movies to watch, most of them are of the type where not much takes place, slow or quiet, and just a few technological multicolored bombarding ones. . Internet is infinite… Facebook is an immense information center of unknown artists, that freely show what they do, without the worries that come with a website (which is always “under construction”). See everybody. Follow no one.
+ Your next project, exhibition.
FK Projects… There are always many things going around. I like organizing workshops for group activities, and thinking about ways of opening doors to show students’ work in Argentina and in the world (Accessory Design, Kweitel-Kohon chair, FADU, UBA).
Not an exhibit of my own, no. I’ve never done an individual show; maybe someday, but not for now, I don’t feel that need at all.+
FK Projects… There are always many things going around. I like organizing workshops for group activities, and thinking about ways of opening doors to show students’ work in Argentina and in the world (Accessory Design, Kweitel-Kohon chair, FADU, UBA).
Not an exhibit of my own, no. I’ve never done an individual show; maybe someday, but not for now, I don’t feel that need at all.+
Latido gathers Argentine contemporary visual projects, conducts art and design exhibits, and promotes independent books and objects, as well as design products. Fabian Trigo is its creative director.
Translation by Mercedes Pico
