The human balero
As an artist you are always playing an uncomfortable game. You are on the spot, troubled, half naked, split between yourself and your artwork, turned inside out, being the human balero.
Surrender to the Unattainable is the motto that inspired the latest salon-style event hosted by Zoraya Rohde in Frankfurt two weeks ago. The evening consisted of a group exhibition featuring artists Jana Hartmann, Beatriz Morales and me, as well as a brief talk and a performative game orchestrated by Zoraya—one that is played in Panama and Colombia.
The game, a kind of Mexican human balero, consists of wearing a belt with an empty cup attached to the front, instead of a belt button, and a small ball that hangs from a thread between the participant’s legs. The objective is to move the hips so that the ball swings and falls inside the cup. Most participants moved their bodies back and forth like a strange pendulum, which was amusing and somehow sexual. Others broke the toy or tried alternative, football-inspired gestures. While the game should not be much of a challenge for Colombians or Panamanians, in Germany, some did better than others. But the point was not to master it, but to laugh, fail, and embrace the unattainable.
I did not participate in the game. I was already “out there”, showing my artworks. As an artist, no matter how many times you exhibit your work, or the importance or magnitude of the exhibition, you are always playing an uncomfortable game. You are on the spot, half naked, split between yourself and your artwork, turned inside out, troubled by expectations, playing cup and ball, being the human balero.
—That is the spirit! You repeat to yourself, but the mantra falls short. And coming to terms with trouble is something we learn as artists, but it hurts every time we exhibit. Art has been a place for me to think freely and be rebellious. It has been a place of unconformity. Because of art, I am still a teenager. And that spirit should not be hidden away. It is also one of the reasons we respect artists, visit exhibitions, museums, or collect art.
Art is also about resilience. Understanding this is both our blessing and the cross we carry. We learn to continue regardless of the circumstances: if nervous, confused, happy or depressed, we continue. If someone cuts the funding, we find the money, rent the van, carry the work, hang it, promote it, do the exhibition and even sell the work. This bliss, of course, is also a trap, as we cannot imagine any alternative to being artists. Artists only know about art-making.
Maybe to his discontent from the grave, I will appropriate David Alfaro Siqueiro’s famous words “There’s no other route than ours”, a phrase that marked his dogmatic artistic and political position towards social struggle, and re-signify it to: “There is no other route than this one”.
This text is not about renouncing. When not romantic, I celebrate resilience. It entails movement. In contrast, and driven by fear, stillness is a dangerous illusion that has populated our ways of living and politics across the globe.
I’ll come back to the subject of resilience after the gallery week in Mexico has ended. For now, a lot of energy is needed, not only to survive the week physically but to endure the current crisis affecting artists, galleries, and institutions.
