Arts Issue
Joana Vasconcelos, the artist who believes in harmony as a way to save the world.
In October 2018, in a conversation with Vogue Portugal, Joana Vasconcelos had already made her purpose as an artist clear: “Artists have a responsibility to think about the world around them, and to provide other ways of seeing that contribute to broadening our perception and knowledge of it. With my work, I don't want the works to be enclosed in a discourse, but to be inquisitive, imbued with a multiplicity of discourses and interpretations that lead us to open our horizons.” Now, five years later, she welcomes us to his studio - a gigantic space on the banks of the Tagus that is a creative's paradise - and the intention remains the same: “My works have an aspect of analyzing society, of what we're experiencing at the moment. I try to criticize in a positive and constructive way, but there are a lot of paradoxes. (...) I don't use anything that people don't know from home, I take inspiration from the domestic environment and everything that surrounds us. Then I turn them around, take it out of and contextualize them in another, more intellectual dimension. In this decontextualization and conversion, there is a discourse, but I would say that almost everyone recognizes one part or another - they project their idea, their culture, their age, their experience onto the work, and so the analyses are made by people. For me, all analyses are valid. Now, you can always think critically in a positive and constructive way. If people aren't going to be constructive afterwards, that's their problem.”
Joana refers not only to her purpose as an artist, but to a remark we made during the interview: no one leaves an exhibition of hers sad, gloomy, which is very rare when what is at stake - even if it isn't obvious at first glance - is a reflection on the world and society. In Joana Vasconcelos’ universe there is a clear concern with themes such as human rights or the role of women, but these issues are thought of in an almost playful way - with a thousand and one colors, embroidery, tiles... On the surface, her pieces don't take themselves too seriously, but on second glance there's plenty of room for thought. “Yes, that's it. It's very interesting to see how you can make, for instance, a shoe, a chandelier, a wedding cake or any other piece, that make us think about latent issues in our society and have them become almost political.” From pots and pans to tampons, Joana was one of the first artists to unashamedly include many elements of Portuguese culture and tradition in her work. Before her, it was almost as if we had a trauma and avoided picking these things up - let alone exhibiting them in a museum or gallery. “It's funny, because nowadays I realize how important it was, but for me it was natural. It's like opening the drawer in the house and not being afraid to take the crochets out of the drawer. I often say that I'm the person who opened the drawers in the house and took things out and made things. And that's the word to use, trauma. And I think the word trauma is very important in this matter, because the Portuguese actually came out of a very long and prolonged, very difficult dictatorship, and Portugal's self-esteem was reduced to zero, we were reduced to very little, to a very large ‘closure’, a lack of communication, a lack of contemporaneity, a lack of joy, a frightening lack of dynamism. (…) Our parents, who are still alive and who fought for independence in Portugal, tried to build a country where that didn't exist, a modern, contemporary country where we will grow up. We were brought up in a democracy, but many people weren't brought up in a democracy. There's still a kind of remnant of that trauma. That trauma has been put away.” You almost had to leave the island to be able to see it, and then return. “It's one of the symbols of that era. It's the clichés, the women locked up at home without being able to go to school, the women who had no expression other than their role [in the family], their domestic role and their manual work. Contemporary women don't want to go back to that situation. So what they do is keep the symbols of that time in the drawer. But everyone had grandmothers, aunts, mothers, cousins, crocheting. It wasn't that long ago. So what did I do? I went and opened the drawers and said, 'there's nothing wrong with that.’ Crochet was done by our aunts and grandmothers. In many cases, it was the only form of expression these women had. There were also others who were forced to crochet and who hated it. But there are those who found it the only way to show who they were. The women had no expression at all. They couldn't do anything, they didn't know anything. And it was only through crochet and manual work that they could express their creativity and how special they were at cooking and embroidering. So this trauma, which is the collective female trauma, has its origins in the domestic environment. What I did was to start dealing with the traumas of the domestic environment, the pots, the chandeliers, the crochet, the fabrics, the tampons, all the objects I took out [of the drawer], the sewing machines, the showers, the bathroom, everything that I turned into works of art a little to atone for. That's enough, let's not get stuck.”
A “collective female trauma”, suggests Joana. How many more could there be? Will she, like other female artists, ever be treated in the same way as a “male artist”? Will she ever be asked the same questions? Or won’t she be asked the same questions? For example, that cliché only asked to women: how does being a woman affect your work as an artist? Are we close to reaching a point of “equality”? "Not really. “I think there's still a lot to do. Firstly, because I'm sitting here where I am. It's a privilege, because I can be who I want to be, because I'm in a super-privileged context, I'm in a country in Europe, in a city that is Lisbon, I was brought up in a certain way... I'm the result of a series of privileges, but I understand those who haven't had them. And until human rights are equal, until men and women have the same human rights, respecting, of course, the differences that exist... But as long as human rights are not a global reality and not confined to a few geographical areas, which is the case of Europe and the United States, the rest of the world doesn't really have the same conditions that I have and that we have here. So I feel privileged. But I also feel like a minority and I shouldn't feel like a minority. We all have the same human rights as men. In this privilege that I have, I have often been discriminated against for being a woman in my own life. I'm talking about my own experience, my own life, and that makes me realize how far we still are from achieving this harmony between men and women. It doesn't exist yet at all - it's much better, there's a long way to go, but there's still no parity and no harmony, and so we have to do this work, we have to make people aware so that there is this harmony.”
For this to happen, art can have no limits. Cancellation culture tries, social networks push, but Joana believes it's possible to create without barriers. “I think anything is possible because art is an expression of its own time. All artists reflect the moment in which they live, they are inspired by many different themes and issues. But in reality, art only translates what it has around it. The limit is the limit of the present or the influence of the past. But, somehow, artists are all on one terrain, the terrain of the present. And they reflect what surrounds them. Anything can happen within these circumstances. I can't reflect a future where I'm not. I can only think about the present where I am, the country, the culture, my perspective and so on. So, on the one hand, this idea of limitlessness doesn't make sense. On the other hand, it's the ability of human beings to express themselves. If you could bring together all the artists who exist at the moment, you would have a very interesting view of the world, because you would have various interpretations from various people around the world, each in their own place, looking at the world in a certain way. That's why they do joint exhibitions, to reflect the present. And then you often draw parallels with people from the past to make a comparison between how they saw the world and how it is now. That’s why museums are a very important place for reflection.”
Museums are spaces she knows like no other. Her exhibition at the Guggenheim Bilbao in 2018 was the third most visited in the museum's history. In 2012, her exhibition at the Palace of Versailles was the most visited in France in 50 years, with a record 1.6 million visitors. With this year's achievements, Joana extends (even further) a career that became international in 2005 with The Bride, at the first Venice Biennale curated exclusively by women. As her official website points out, in 2023 she “had the honor of exhibiting at the Uffizi Galleries and Pitti Palace in Florence, alongside classical masters such as Leonardo Da Vinci, Michelangelo or Caravaggio” and inaugurated the Plug-in exhibition at MAAT in Lisbon, after a decade without exhibiting in the capital - a homecoming, considering that the show is curated by João Pinharanda, the creator of the EDP Foundation's New Artists Award, which Joana won in 2000. In February, she installed one of her Valkyries at Dior's fall/winter 2023 fashion show. Entitled Valkyrie Miss Dior, the artist used fabrics from the maison's collection to create the large-scale piece. She also designed the entire set, from the benches to the walls, in a kind of immersive collaboration that resulted in 250 million views, more than double the usual number. “And that translates into visibility. And in sales, of course. And in something that's different. And what was different was this harmony between the work and the collection and the way that brand works.” The success was such that she ended up replicating the feat in all Dior stores around the world - the same will happen soon in Lisbon, where the brand opens its first flagship store in our country. In June, she "assembled" a Wedding Cake in the gardens of Waddesdon Manor, the historic residence of the Rothschild family, northwest of London - the work, “an absurd slice of joy”, in the words of the Minister for Foreign Affairs, João Cravinho, is 12 meters high, and is further proof that when the intention is to convey happiness, size doesn't matter; to complete it, around 25,000 tiles from the Viúva Lamego factory, 1,238 pieces of ceramic and 3,500 pieces of wrought iron, all produced in Portugal. Last year, in 2022, she was made an Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters by the French Ministry of Culture. In a world where people still insist on using the term “woman artist”, she is proof that there are cases where talent and genius make it necessary to apply the term “total artist.”
Even so, Joana dispenses with comparisons with other peers. What would she say, for instance, to those who consider her the Andy Warhol of the 21st century? “I'd say it's wrong because Andy Warhol was Andy Warhol. In his time. Andy Warhol had his moment and his strength and Andy is a person who makes a big mark on the world history of art, but I make a different mark, in my time and in my place. I see artists as a chain, in other words, we are all part of a chain, we are links in a chain, and then the chain has various personalities and I am only here because there is Andy Warhol, or because there is a Louise Bourgeois, or because there is a Vieira da Silva, or because there was a Paula Rego. We can't exist without others. We are the consequences of a line of thought, of a development. The only thing I hope is to have added a link that is strong and lasting so that others after me can continue this chain. (...) This is a network with strong links. And the more it generates, the more beauty it generates, the more harmony.” The notion of harmony is a constant in Joana Vasconcelos' discourse, who equates it with beauty. As if together they were the only possible way to save the world - or, at least, to try to save it. “That's why Pope Francis received the artists at the Vatican, to ask all those who contribute to beauty to do so, because we're at a time when it's fundamental to bring harmony to the world. (...) He said ‘I'm working towards harmony, I can't do it alone, I need you who are the mind to help me.’ He, who is the spirit, bringing awareness and harmony to the body. Because the body is very confused. In other words, the political leaders of our world don't have much awareness and mental dimension. We all realize that this is a mistake. What happens? We can't influence the body because the body is in contradiction and so there is a harmony here that has disappeared. And the Pope is asking everyone to help restore this harmony. I think it's possible, but I think we all have to contribute. Me, with my way of being, with my work and with what I try to do every day, which is to bring harmony first to myself, then to my studio, then to the place where I am, which is Portugal, and then to all the places I go in the world and where people welcome me. I try to convey this idea of beauty and this idea of harmony and happiness. Leaving an exhibition with a smile is all I ask of people. That people leave free and happy. That's what I work for.”
*Originally translated from the Arts Issue, published November 2023. Full credits and stories in the print issue.
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