Mystery of Love: Raul Hott, Sophie Mallett

MYSTERY OF LOVE: Raul Hott, Sophie Mallett Fellow artist solo project

27/11/2018 at 19:00

28/11/2018

Centro de residencias artísticas (Nave 16), Matadero Madrid

Madrid

Sophie Mallett
Raúl Hott

E.M.M.A. (Experimenting Methods and Means in Arts) is pleased to present Raúl Hott (Chile) and Sophie Mallett’s (UK) works developed at Centro de residencias artisticas of Matadero Madrid, following the inaugural communal gathering of the annual research program Mystery of Love started in Palermo together with artist Pauline Curnier Jardin and informed by, among other things, The Art of Joy of Goliarda Sapienza. On this occasion, the two fellow artists look at spontaneous forms of expression and healing, such as canine language and nudism, of certain communities while revealing propitious situations and architectures where they take place and irrational forces that arise from desire.

Lol, sploot, blep, blop, bork by Sophie Mallett is the first in a new series of video work that addresses the complex conversations we avoid. The video is set in a seemingly abandoned park where grand spaces built for communal interaction are left unoccupied. This park becomes the setting for a different kind of communality. Doggos, the only frequent visitors to the park, come together to help us understand the subtle and explicit ways that we avoid acknowledging our own complicity. It is a personal reflection on exploitation and inadequacy that uses our dearest friends, and an aesthetic of cuteness and anthropomorphic attraction, to confront uncomfortable hypocrisies. In this alternate world, doggos blop and mlem while they philosophise on the systems of control that manage exploitation. Their dialogue is adapted from writings on whiteness, by Houria Bouteldja and Robin DiAngelo. The doggos open up the space between ideology and action entrenched in white liberalism.

Efecto-Afecto (Effect-Affect) by Raúl Hott is a system that unlocks and activates affection. By putting the necessary conditions in place, it establishes a lived experience where there is the potential to initiate affection. The system is designed with the aim of invigorating one’s life force; seeking to rehabilitate affection and bring a deeper understanding of our capacity to affect others and, in turn, be affected. The system is non-sexual, nudist and helps the body let go of its inhibitions. It continues in the legacy of using nudity as a form of therapy, taken from the many explorations within the field of psychology, as well as health reforms made in the twentieth century. At the same time, the project centres on how architecture has the power to affect us neurologically. With this in mind, Efecto-Afecto consists of a set of exercises and tools that construct a specific setting. Users experiment with the use of space, music, movement and light as well as temperature. All of these affect and generate changes in both the space and bodies.

↖ Sophie Mallett, Lol, Sploot, Blep, Blop, Bork ↖ Raul Hott, Efecto/Afecto