Fons #01: Esther Ferrer
MACBA’s Audiovisual Documentation Fonds features a series of interviews with artists represented in the MACBA Collection.
Fons #01 offers a look back over Esther Ferrer's career from her beginnings with the Zaj Group to reflections on the passing of time, touching on her working methods, creative processes and commenting on her works "Íntimo y personal" and "Silla Zaj", both of which form part of the MACBA Collection.
Works
Esther Ferrer carried out her first performance in 1967, and since then that ephemeral practice has become the leitmotif of her work. The spectator’s role and the concept of her performances are similar to Bertol Brecht’s theater in which the absence of fiction on stage and the isolation that the spectator feels provoke consciousness and critical reflection. For Ferrer the performer is not an actor, but an element that executes an action, and what happens in a performance is real. It is evidence of materiality and moves away from any illusionist game. At the same time the artist tries to transmit a consciousness of the passing of time: Time, Space (which includes mental space) and Presence (hers and everyone’s) are elements that manipulate her actions in which she usually incorporates everyday objects: hammers, watches, tables, chairs, frames, threads, ropes, shoes, etc.
