Francesc Torres

Synopsis by Brian Truglio

What made Francesc Torres move from sculpture and conceptual art to installation was the simple fact that he wanted to tell stories. Installation added the one element to his work that was necessary to tell a story, time. In addition, he wanted to tell these stories in non-linear and non-traditional ways so that the viewer of his work would take responsibility for the reading of the story.

Torres claims his work has always been focused on three topics: social behavior, politics and memory. In his move from sculpture and conceptual to installation art he managed to short circuit the normal route that artists take. That is to say he moved directly from the alternative spaces in which he began working to the museum avoiding galleries altogether. His installation work was inappropriate for galleries since it did not consist of anything that could be collected or sold. What made installation art’s move into the museum possible was the creation of new time based departments (i.e. film and video departments) within many museum’s structures. Ultimately, this broadened the museum’s function from being a passive receptor of historical artifacts to becoming an active participant in time-based mediums and the creation of contemporary artwork.

To give examples of his installation work, Torres chose to show slides of four of his works: "The Crystal Continent" (1994), "Fury of the Saints" (1997), "A Historical Prologue to the Burning of Life" (1997) and "The Repository of Absent Flesh" (1998). "Crystal Continent" was installed in a warehouse in Barcelona. 48,000 identical bottles were placed in a square in the center of the long warehouse. At one end of the bottles was a glass house with six TV’s broadcasting six European TV stations. At the other end, a steamroller that advanced daily toward the glass house, crushing the bottles. On either side of the bottles were glass mounds, volcanoes, with parts of the bodies resembling the wax offerings Catholics make in Spain to pray for healing. Torres wanted to commemorate the upcoming 50th anniversary of the end of WWII while reminding viewers of the war that Europe was ignoring in the Balkans. As he said, "a continent without content is open to the unrestrained exercise of social violence."

"Fury of the Saints" was installed at MIT. It was, in part, a question about what is necessary in the realm of human behavior to ignite a revolution or to fall in love, what is the faith that moves things forward. A video screen made of salt lay on the floor and was surrounded by fiberglass and handpainted saints seemingly suspended. The saints were three dimensional reproductions from historical paintings of martyrs depicting the ways in which they were killed. One saint’s head was replaced with Trotsky’s. The video projected down onto the salt screen contained footage of a man and a woman but it was unclear whether they were fighting or making love.

"(A) Historical Prologue to the Burning of Life" was installed in Prague and consisted of five bodies made of baked bread and a chair with a perfect pair of gloves on it. This was a reminder of the horrific atrocities committed in the name of fascism and of the dark history of the building in which they were committed.

"The Repository of Absent Flesh" was installed at MIT. The space was made to look like a customs house which contained 20 objects each on its own metal table. The tables were connected with metal rollers similar to those used to move parcel packages along. The stories connected with these objects were triggered by people moving through the space. Over time, the viewer or viewers could begin to relate stories, piece them together or contrast them to create new and more complex ones.

All of these installations led up to Torres’ most recent work: a mile long promenade in Barcelona that will be realized over the next few months. For Torres, the garden space is a peaceful meeting ground of nature and culture. He approaches the promenade as an installation but has problems with considering it public art. As he perceptibly pointed out, all art is public as long as gallery and museum doors remain open to the public. According to him, art in urban spaces is not so much public as unfiltered. The buffer of the gallery or the museum is absent. His plan for the space includes long metal line made out of stainless steel connecting a large A at one end of the promenade to a similar B at the other. Historical facts from the area mixed with residents’ stories and everyday experiences will be engraved on the line. Realizing the project took two years and involved many dialogues and political negotiations, as well as working meetings in order to find ways to keep the costs down, which was accomplished. In the end the history of the area will be constructed through the repeated and brief encounters of its pedestrians.

Analysis by Nancy Wynn

Installation art often constructs a space in which interdisciplinary media reside. Francesc Torres controls his installations with intention and reason founded in his conceptual background to address issues of memory, history, politics, social behavior, and ideology. His installations are usually within interior environments: museums, galleries, or industrial sites, such as the site from The Crystal Continent. These installations are created using technology (video and computers), sculpture, lighting and various other materials. Torres seduces the viewer into his installations through the use of time and materials, but more importantly through mystery and tension. In all the examples of his work–"Crystal Continent" (1994), "Fury of the Saints" (1997), and "The Repository of Absent Flesh" (1998)–time, materials and tension were constructed with the intention of creating questions. The satisfaction of receiving or understanding the whole was subverted by fragments and levels of metaphors.

Torres’s success lies in both the strength of the fragment and the whole. His most recent exhibition at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, "The Repository of Absent Flesh" (1998), succeeded on both levels. It was comprised of twenty stations of fragments, objects or evidence, telling stories that viewers could interpret as whole or as separate entities. Viewers moved through the installation triggering lights and audio related to each of the objects. Depending on the numbers of viewers moving through the installation at one time, the interactive experience would be different. Dialogues began between participants as they tried to understand the installation’s symbols, speech and metaphors. At times, the installation was a nonsensical performance of animated objects desperately seeking to tell their stories. The usual intimate space of a gallery had been transformed into public theater. Torres discussed this phenomenon, noting that museums and galleries had embraced installation in the late 1970s, creating a new type of public space within a private space. The gallery was placed in a new context, the context of becoming an active agent for creating art.

Torres’s latest project is in Barcelona and will be realized within the next two months. The description was elaborate and insightful, contrasting and comparing the differences between interior and exterior public spaces. The installation consists of transforming a mile-long promenade in the center aisle of a busy street. At one end of the installation will be the letter A, at the other end will be the letter B, both three-dimensional. In between these letters will be a straight line in the center of the promenade surfacing and submerged into the ground, sewing or stitching together the part of the promenade sliced by the perpendicular streets. On this line will be embedded text with historical excerpts about the surrounding neighborhood. He called the one-mile long installation a "low- intensity intervention." Perhaps the term derives from the installation’s conceptual emphasis. The viewer’s interaction is minimal compared to his previous work. The public will see it, walk by it, and read it, but their presence will not transform the work. Instead, Torres will transform the landscape of the Barcelona promenade into an aesthetic experience as well as provide text-based historical references to past events in the surrounding neighborhood. Torres admits that collaborating with government agencies, architects, historians, and neighborhoods in a public art project was difficult, stating that the consensus process produces a more filtered product, and requires greater political dialogue. He noted how this process itself is perhaps public art.

Can the process of developing public art produce artwork that is both engaging aesthetically and concerned with interaction and participation with its public? The artist and the public need to ask questions addressing motivations surrounding public art projects. Are the motivations of the government or institutions overriding the artist’s intentions? Are the artist’s motivations overriding the interest of the people who will interact with the artwork? Francesc Torres has always created and transformed public space by fostering a dialogue between art and its audience. Generally his installations create frameworks for engagement which may produce reflection on social issues.