El Naufragio del Tiempo, Inés Sendra
Curator: Catalina Bunge
Artist: Inés Sendra
Location: Hungry Art (Mvd)
Dates: 4th y 5th August 2023
El Naufragio del Tiempo
Constructed in the 1930s and situated at the crossroads of Avenida Brasil and Juan Benito Blanco in Montevideo, El Mástil is something of a vintage building, yet it continues to resonate with life. Its pulse is fueled by its residents who, from one generation to the next, breathe new life into its existence. Inés Sendra, a denizen of the building, felt this pulse intensify in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, realizing herself as an integral part of this heartbeat. Consequently, she was able to rehearse her own life with a different rhythm. An encounter with pause became one of these rhythms—a sudden encounter that occurs each time she returns home, enters the building, traverses the corridors, waits for the elevator, exchanges greetings with the doorman, engages in conversation with a neighbor, hears the closing of a door, a barking dog, and the slow progress of a cart. In this convergence, a sense of timelessness arises as a recurring sensation akin to the void time produced by the pandemic. Thus, ensues the feeling of being in a film devoid of both a beginning and an end. For Sendra, time awaits her, as it awaits us all.
Seventeen photographs form the visual narrative of El Mástil—a building marooned amidst the city and time itself. Portraits of its inhabitants, communal spaces, and the very essence of the building are presented by Sendra as a cinematic story. Within this scenery, temporality takes on an aesthetic quality. Subdued lighting imbues the atmosphere with material contrasts between luminous spaces and profound voids. The building and its residents, with their expressions and routines, appear to hail from another era, as if they were part of the art deco embellishments adorning the structure. A certain synchronicity between the building and its occupants, between light and walls, between emptiness and silence, underscores this shared pulse.
In her act of photography, the artist is not merely seeking to document; no, her photos carry something more—a longing, a hope, a fresh avenue for self-expression. Sendra imbues this pivotal pandemic moment with new meaning through a photographic narrative that oscillates between the documentary and the fictional. The inhabitants and the building exhibit a conspiratorial performativity that places them both front and center. In Sendra's narrative, there are no discernible boundaries; the characters and the space pulsate in unison.
Drawing from Jacques Derrida's concept of simultaneous memory, taking a photograph generates an alternative narrative of reality—one that diverges from the immediate experience and journeys through time, perhaps unfolding reality or even time itself.
Through her narrative, Sendra propounds an alternate, relative, and disjointed temporal experience, one that encompasses pause as an integral facet of existence. Is this distinctive temporality a product of El Mástil and its residents? Is it an elusive time, perceptible only to those who inhabit it? Is it a byproduct of the disconcerting experience of the pandemic? How might this then transform our comprehension of time?
Catalina Bunge