Voltaic arc, 2016

Desk 80 x 83 x 82,5 cm. Iron.
Photograph 38 x 28,5 cm. Digital print mounted on wood.
Book 24 x 16 cm. Hugh Thomas. The Civil War. Paris, Publisher Ruedo Ibérico, 1961.

The installation Voltaic arc consists of a news item, a desk and a book. The news item can be found in the magazine “Crónica” of 7 February 1937 and reports on the inauguration of the Instituto para Obreros (Institute for Workers) de Valencia. It shows a photograph of a group of future pupils posing next to several desks. The desk, which is related to learning, is also notable for its modern design in this case. The book, entitled The Spanish Civil War, was written by Hugh Thomas and published in Paris in 1961 by the exile publisher Ruedo Ibérico as the first in its collection.

The installation seeks to interrelate the three elements. To achieve this, the structure of one of these desks has been replicated, so that the frames of the table and the seat can be linked, when viewed from above, with the rectangles on the cover of the book (1). With this relationship and playing with the metaphorical idea of an electric arc, the aim is for the desk to act as an arc or bridge between a positive electrode: the news that represents the republican hope, and another negative one: the book that represents its decline or end.

(1) This first book of the Ruedo Ibérico publishing house was designed with a touch of modernity by the Swiss typographer André Gürtler.

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Exhibition:
Presence and Absence
G6 Gallery. IVAM. Valencia. From 26 January to 7 May 2017.