2024

Three Sisters

Sismógrafo, O’Porto

They happened in Sanganer, Rajasthan, northwest India, in April 2023. Each one of them is five meters long by about one and a half meters wide and is made with natural dyes on cotton fabric. The measurements are important, because they speak of the place of origin—the worktable in the warehouse workshop of Vikram Joshi, owner of the Rangotri textile factory and a connoisseur of natural dyeing practices, as it was (and still is, but sparsely) practiced in various regions of India. This is the second time I have rented him a worktable to do what you see here.  Why Three Sisters? More because of what it can mean (and acknowledging the 87/88 cartoons —“Il était une fois… la vie”) and less for the references in literature—Chekhov and Gertrude Stein (though they do have an influence behind the scenes). Of course, this is literal—we do see three fabrics (ha! ha!) familiar to each other, coming from the same place, sharing the same elements and materials—natural dyes, vegetable fibers. We have repetition and its failures, interruptions, small differences generating unpredictable abysses in the way of being, as between sisters, “who are not sisters”.