Covermotiv: Iannis Xenaxis, study for Polytope de Cluny (light trajectory diagrams), c. 1972. With kind permission by les Amis de Xenakis. All rights reserved. For the cover, the original drawing was processed by Beton.
The project what a Beauty by Irasema Fernández began as a series of street interventions in Mexico City. During her fellowship at Akademie Schloss Solitude, the project evolved into a zine, which she is excited to share with visitors in an outdoor exhibition at Utopia Kiosk on August 31 at 5 PM.
These interventions invited reflection on the inherited shame toward our bodies, linking it to the biblical concept of original sin. The work delves into how guilt manifests in daily life through unattainable beauty standards and our relationship with food. Inspired by Margarita Pisano’s work, what a Beauty examines the contradictions we face regarding our self-image: the desire to pursue hegemonic beauty and the need to reconcile our body image at a necessary moment.
»We grew up with the idea that guilt takes the form of our flesh. I saw how guilt multiplied around me, manifesting itself as bread and food.«
»If the body is a boundary with non-transferable limits from human to human, why is it so difficult to stop comparing ourselves?«
»We are walking contradictions. Sometimes we love beauty and sometimes we hate it. Sometimes, we wish we could move in a gray space where beauty does not matter.«
»No battle against the mandates of beauty can be won, however, I ask myself if there is anything to do but fight. I also wonder what I could do so that the people I love, and anyone who reads this zine (including me), can reconcile their body image at a necessary moment.«
»This text was written in a way to encourage individual adaptations by each reader based on their own experiences such that each person can put their own discomforts about having a body into words.«
Program:
5 pm: Collective Creation of the exhibition
7 pm: Zine Lecture N°2 Zines and Embodiment
8 pm: Panel About »what a Beauty«
Irasema Fernández is a writer, visual artist and activist. She studied Hispanic Literature and Languages at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. Her work explores narratives about the female body in its political, colonial and cultural contexts. She has been awarded fellowships in Novel Writing (2021) and Short Story Writing (2018) from the Mexican National Foundation for Culture and the Arts. In 2020, she was invited to the Hay Festival Querétaro to deliver a Masterclass on how urban art and public protest has been the key to effective community building and cross-cultural dialogue. She is currently a fellow at Akademie Schloss Solitude in the Societal sphere of practice.
A cooperation of Akademie Schloss Solitude and Utopia Kiosk.
participated in