Unbound by her skin

We Are Safe Here, a solo exhibition of new works by the BOLT artist-in-residence, Leticia Bernaus. Chicago Artists Coalition, May 7 - June 17, 2021.

We walk through a dark curtain, the light changes, and suddenly, too, we hear the water. There is no definitive word for the sound water makes when it crashes against itself. One can say burble, or babble, or ripple, or trickle, but they all seem too playful, and running seems too quick. How do we name the sound a river makes when nobody crosses it? How do we call the never-ending work of fountains? We hear the water, but we cannot know from where it comes. To the left, projected on a rectangle of black fabric —fixed against a white wall, giving the impression of a forbidden window, a promise of depth—, we see white forms, lines that break and change; a video that is not made to be analyzed frame by frame, but that offers a sense of movement, the medium’s basic, mysterious emotion.

On the adjacent wall another world is being projected, in color this time, but also on the move. Before us we see swimming fish, flying dragonflies, obstinate mosquitos, but it is impossible to know from where we are looking. We are either below or above water, which is in fact never still. The scene changes —backlit eucalyptus leaves—, but the feeling of a world that is alive remains. We know, of course, that trees are alive, but they never seem more so than when cradled by the wind. And suddenly, sitting there, facing the two videos on loop, accompanied by the unnamable and placid sound of water, I start to feel that these things, this way of naming them —alive, movement, mystery, emotion—, is not mine but Bernaus’, and I think that if an artist is able to give us a language with which to speak, then there is little else we can ask for.

Leticia Bernaus’ We Are Safe Here is an exhibit, but it is also a private creed, one that in showing itself to the world, compels us to share it. It is an argument made by other means: Bernaus has found a way to decipher certain signs (“the winds blowing, the flowers blooming in the spring, the beast rutting, the poet composing”) and the work is her invitation to take us by the hand as a method to grasp the world.

I started with the videos, but perhaps these should be saved for last. They are –or so I think— the world into which Bernaus throws us, sans context, no clues, to look at the water, trees and wind with other eyes, ones that have passed through the filter of her words and hands, words like rocks to hold unto in the middle of a desert of blank space, open palms at the center of other large, black rectangles. One should start, then, by walking towards the open hands that call us, those immense photographs of gracious hands that encircle the room, and that execute something akin to a prayer, or a yoga posture, or the circle that an elegant dancer would draw with her arms in the air, above the stage. Everything seems, in fact, choreography: not just the hands that turn but the pictures too, and those long sheets of paper with miniscule text, set at different heights, which force us to lift and lower our heads, move our bodies closer —move in order to understand. Move like water falling from the waterfall Bernaus turns into a poem, float like birds in mid-air, pile up strings of images like we do in dreams.

There is a logic of the essential behind her choice of printed words; the feeling, almost impossible to verbalize, that there is something shared between all elements and creatures of this planet, a notion of totality, plural and inclusive. Again and again we stand before words that point towards a collective dimension: everything, all things, all, we. The body is like earth; the wind is like the poet. We move around and collect these impossible analogies, that nonetheless make sense if one thinks of our world as one. We are (all) safe here, says Bernaus, and the necessary authority to make such a bold promise comes from experience.

The central image of the exhibit is the artist’s right hand, bathed in an intense red dye that dries up just below the wrist. The five fingers point towards the sky. The hand is firm but not tense— it neither clenches nor obstructs. It is not a stop sign but an offering, an oath without the bible. It is a prehistoric hand, if you wish; it has been so long since we stopped smearing our palms to speak our minds. It is the mark that founds this cave, dark and yet welcoming, where we have been standing for some time now. It is a hand that has been immersed in something, in someone. My guess would be Bernaus, who delves inside herself without fear and, unbound by her skin, comes back to tell us about it.

Luis Madrigal 

This project is supported in part by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency, through federal funds provided by the National Endowment for the Arts.